A black red squirrel or a red squirrel that’s black?

Recently I saw a mutant. Not a hideous green monster that lurks in sewers, that would be a very different story entirely. The mutant I saw was small, black with long tufty ears and a big white patch on its belly; a black squirrel. With the speed of a ninja and the audacity of a squirrel shed of its inhibitions, the little fella leapt from tree to tree right before my eyes as I sipped my morning coffee. At one point the wee ninja misjudged the gap between branches, but like a miniature Vin Diesel he defied all odds and twisted his body in a way that only porn stars can do and grasped another branch with his tiny paws.

And then just like that he was gone. As it was my third coffee of the morning in question I didn’t quite trust my own eyes.

Like a good student of journalism, or someone with far too much caffeine in their system and too much time on their hands, I opted to find out more. Google enlightened me that, of course, there have been sightings of black squirrels in the Alps.

A lot of the debate focused on whether the sightings were black red squirrels or, black fox squirrels. My colour blindness aside, I am almost certain that this was in fact a black red squirrel. So why was it black?

Again fuelled by caffeine I opted to delve nose first into this most mysterious of rabbit holes.

It turns out that the wee black ninja squirrel is not only a fearless daredevil like Vin Diesel, it may also be more resistant to petty things like illness — just like Diesel is, come on the resemblance is uncanny.

According to an article in The Telegraph from 2014, black grey squirrels are becoming more and more common. A genetic mutation that stops their fur from changing colour also gives them added immunity to disease. Fancy that.

The black squirrel basically lacks a piece of DNA that is responsible for its colour. When grey squirrels are growing there is an on/off switch on a hormone which either creates black fur(on) or orange and white fur (off) — because grey squirrels fur is actually striped. The black squirrel’s hormone switch is stuck on, and since the off button is missing, it stays put. Voila, a black squirrel is created.

It’s been suggested that black squirrels are more aggressive — due to more testotorone in their bodies — than their grey counterparts thus making them more attractive to potential mates, but apparently there is little evidence to support this (scuppering another potential Vin Diesel comparison, darn).