Possible tree sap around females mouth, paws, fur

[craig2l]

This is the second time we've seen this blackish substance around a female's mouth, her paws and some of her fur. We've speculated it might be tree sap (we have quite a few conifers around here that create a heavy sap). The female otherwise seems fine, moves fine and eats nuts that we've provided. Has anyone else seen this? It seems like it must be unpleasant to have this attached to one's body without an easy way of removing it. Picture attached. Thank you for any advice. We are in Oakland CA.

Craig

[CritterMom]

Close. Many tree nuts grow with a thick casing that has to rot off when the nuts fall before you can actually access the shell - hickories, walnuts and others. The casings were often used to make dye by the early settlers. Squirrels don't wait for them to rot off - they gnaw them off and that is what you see. You will really only run into these grubby guys in the fall because that is when the nuts mature.

[craig2l]

Thank you for responding Crittermom. It doesn't appear that the substance is just a dye. Their fur appears to be matted as if it's a sticky substance (like a sap) that is involved. We will try to touch the area where the matting is to determine if it's more like a sap. This particular girl allows us to touch her so we will try to determine the nature of the substance. We are hoping that whatever it is it will either wear off or through the natural regeneration of tissue and fur it will eventually disappear on its own. Last year this time we had another female (lactating at the time) who had a horrible case of this black substance. We saw her rubbing her cheek on our lawn, obviously annoyed by whatever it was. Sadly she developed an open abscess on her cheek (not sure if it was related to the substance or the rubbing... we will never know if it was something else causing the abscess). I was able to catch her (she was VERY sweet with us) and took her to Lindsay Wildlife Rescue here in northern CA but unfortunately they quickly euthanized her, telling us one of her incisors was falling out and they couldn't re-wild her that way. This is a digression from the current issue we have with this new female. I mention this other incident as we'd be heartbroken if complications developed a second time with this new girl.

Craig

[supersquirrelgirl]

Craig,

Hello, Pleasanton here with yard full of wild foxes. We have redwoods, crape myrtles, and pines. Last year, we had terrible season of crepe myrtle trees with aphids' bugs all over and oozing very sticky stuff all over everything. Squirrels running through the trees were covered. I ran the sprinklers in the backyard every other morning to help wash it off.

This honeydew sticky stuff is different from sap as you describe but have water around will help dissolve it too an extent. Another option is spraying warm water if the squirrel trusts you enough. (no spray at the face!) We only used clear water since they quickly smell any additive and run away.

MrSSG

[craig2l]

Thank you! There are in fact some crepe myrtles in our immediate neighborhood. I'll check them out for sticky oozing.
Craig