Baby Red Squirrel being hand fed

This is Girl No.1 from a litter of 4 red squirrels whose drey was blown out of its tree in Northumberland by the tail end of Hurrican Katia. I estimate that they are about 5-6 weeks, so not as young as my previous litter.

This is only the 2nd day that I've had them, so they are still getting the hang of using a teat, but they are getting there and I am hopeful (but not yet totally confident) that they will all survive.

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• red
• squirrels
• handreared

[CreekValleyCritters]

Have you ever used an eyedropper instead ? I find I have more control with an eyedropper than a syringe when I feed a baby animal............Really sweet little squirrels :)

[feorag]

@CreekValleyCritters I always start them off with a 1ml syringe, because it is more controllable than eye droppers or anything else - that small a diameter syrihge prevents flooding. So these were started on a 1ml syringe without any problems. Unfortunately what we find with squirrels is that as they grow they become hyperactive. They should be taking 4-6ml per feed now, but with a 1ml syringe it has to be filled 4-5 times during feeding and once they've had 2-3ml and their bellies are filling

[feorag]

and they get distracted and want to be off, so don't take a full meal. With a 5ml syringe they will concentrate on eating until they are completely full and then will want to be off. This was the first day of trying them with a 5ml syringe and a new teat with a smaller hole which they were having trouble getting used to.

[CreekValleyCritters]

@feorag Flooding is when they get too much milk and breathe it into their nose ? Do you know if one can buy teats small enough for mice ?

[feorag]

@CreekValleyCritters Yes, it's when they take in too much milk to swallow and they sneeze it out their nose. Great care has to be taken if this happens as they can then breathe it into their lungs and end up with inhalation pneumonia and that's very difficult to sort out in tiny vulnerable baby.

As far as I'm aware the smallest size Catac Orphan Feeder Teat is the smallest you can get, certainly in Britain, not sure about other countries. So I don't know if you can get a smaller one.

[feorag]

If I were handrearing them I'd still use a 1ml syringe with the teat and literally drop a drop on the tip of the lips to encourage it to lick it off.

If you search here for handreared stoat there's a video of me feeding a baby stoat from a 1ml syringe. She only weighed 28g and this was her first day feeding, but she's actually coping great with the teat and the syringe.

[TheFlashmans]

They are so cute!!!

So good to see some red squirrels, I have nothing against greys but you so seldom see reds.

They look amazing!

-Elina