The Squirrels Hoard In parts of Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire every
walnut tree that fruited was cleared by..gtey squirrels. I gave one particular example the other day ; another example, from Buckinghamshire, suggests that the squirrels picked but did not necessarily consume the bulk of the walnuts. By diligent search the owners may find their fruit neatly preserved. In a small suburban garden grew one Thuja and a single walnut tree. One morning a grey squirrel was seen descending the trunk of the walnut and carrying a walnut which he presently proceeded to bury at the foot of the Thuja. Six times he repeated the journey. The incident had been quite forgotten till it was recalled a number of years later by the discovery of a prosperous young walnut tree at the foot of the Thuja. When Darwin was investigating seed distribution he gave perhaps insufficient attention to the conscious porterage of the seeds by animals— rats, mice and squirrels, as well as birds. A corns being tough and not very palatable are perhaps spread mo A widely. Rooks are peculiarly fond of carrying them off and failing to devour them ; thereafter what queer seeding beds we find ! On two adjacent trees in an ex-garden of mine were growing at one time a nut-tree—from the bark of the acacia—and a gooseberry, mixed up with a blackberry, in the fork of the sycamore.
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