Washington’s 123 western gray squirrel records sketch two separated strongholds: the oak woodlands around south Puget Sound in Pierce County, and the pine and oak country of the east Cascade foothills in Okanogan and Klickitat counties. Between those poles the map goes nearly empty, a fragmented pattern unusual among the state’s native squirrels.
A big squirrel of oak and pine
The western gray squirrel is the largest tree squirrel native to the Northwest, silver-gray above and clean white below, with a long, white-edged tail. It depends on mature oak and pine-oak woodland, feeding heavily on acorns and pine seeds and building large stick nests, called dreys, high in the canopy. Records from Gifford Pinchot National Forest, the Sinlahekin Wildlife Area, and Conconully mark that woodland tie on both sides of the Cascades.
Busiest at the mast harvest
These squirrels do not hibernate, but they spend cold stretches close to their dreys living on cached food. Washington’s reports crest in September, when acorns and cones ripen and the squirrels are on the ground cutting and burying winter stores, then fade to near nothing by December.
Status in Washington
NatureServe ranks the western gray squirrel S2, Imperiled, in Washington, even though the species remains secure rangewide at G5. It is native to the state, and USGS NAS does not list it as nonindigenous here.
Full species profile
