Flying squirrel juvenile rabies

[squirrelyfe]

Hello!
I haven't been able to find an answer to my question anywhere so i thought I would ask here.
About a week ago my family found a flying squirrel at the bottom of a tree in our backyard. It was small, fully furred with eyes open, but definitely not adult size. After looking at a size chart, I would say it was about 5-6 weeks old.
It was curled up and not moving, so we went to pick it up with gloves and it tried to crawl away but didn't get very far.
We picked it up gently, put it in a box, and took it to an emergency vet clinic in our city. It was in the box on my lap for the journey, and scratched at the sides once while we were driving, but was otherwise quiet.
There was no vet (??? don't know why) at the location but the vet tech said that she would give it fluids and put it in an incubator and send it to our city wildlife rehab center in the morning.
However, we found out the next day that it had died overnight.
Now, I've rehabbed many red squirrels and some flying squirrels before, but never had one die for unknown circumstances,
and I'm a hypochondriac so I've been very worried since then that the flying squirrel had died of rabies.
I contacted my provincial health services and the rabies testing lab, and they said they would do a post-mortem test to put me at ease, although they said it was unlikely it had rabies. Of course, the vet clinic had already disposed of the body so now no test will be done.
The vet tech couldn't offer me any more information regarding the symptoms of the squirrel, which is very frustrating because it seems like she just put it in an incubator and left it.
I've been doing some reading and of all squirrel types, flyers are more likely to have rabies due to their close proximity to bats. But, this was a young squirrel so I'm not sure that the virus could occur in 5 weeks?
Are there any other diseases that may afflict a flyer? Or can they die from falling out of trees?
I know I'm probably being very paranoid, but given the 100% fatality rate of rabies, I'd rather be safe than sorry.
I was not bitten by the squirrel, and I don't think I was scratched (I would've noticed that I hope) but seeing as I did have it in a box for a while on my lap, while I was wearing shorts, I'm scared that it somehow scratched through the box (because I do have a scratch on my leg but that could be from my cat).
I'm probably overthinking it at this point, and after talking to the public health services, they said I don't need the rabies shot but I'm still very scared.
I guess I'm just looking for some expert input on flying squirrel behavior/diseases/ages/etc.
Thanks!

[island rehabber]

In my opinion you're definitely overthinking.....take five nice deeeeeep breaths. :grin2

Young squirrels can absolutely die from falling out of the nest and often do. :( It is highly, highly, HIGHLY unlikely that this flyer was ever bitten by a bat because at its young age it would have been far down in the nest at night when bats are active, and bats do not go into other peoples' nests and bite them.

You would have had to have been bitten by the little flyer, and saliva transmitted from it into your wound, to contract rabies.
When even your health department, whose existence thrives upon panicking people about rabies :grin2, tells you do NOT need the shots, you do not need the shots.

Of all the reasons that baby squirrels fall from the nest and succumb shortly thereafter, rabies is not one of them. Not in my 14 years of squirrel rehab and running this board with stories from all over the planet.

Keep Calm and Love Squirrels :grin3

[Jennefer]

Hi Squirrelyfe! Im with island rehabber...my guess is if he was 5-6 weeks old, if the fall didnt get him, then he could have quickly died from being cold and/or dehydration. They still need a heat source at that age. Not sure how cool it still is up in Canada, but Im in Florida & as hot as it gets here, it stills get cool at night & a baby flyer would not do well on the ground here for long. And if the tech fed it without warming it or hydrating it, that could have killed it too. They usually dont even venture out that young & are still nursing. I have 6 flyers & 4 of them were about a month old & very dehydrated when i got them (fat & sassy now). They wouldnt have made it much longer in wild without mom.

Im sure you have nothing to worry about! And a 6 wk old flyers nails are not strong enough to scratch thru cardboard. :gigg

[Anne]

Flying squirrels have been kept as pets in North America since the 1700's. There has NEVER been a report of a flying squirrel having rabies-----EVER!