First time squirrel owner

[Jenna]

Hi!

My husband brought home a 3-week-old squirrel we intended to rehab and release. (We tried to reunite him with his mom, but she never came back.) Then we learned that 1) it's an invasive species and 2) my husband sent me photos of the squirrel sitting on our (no prey drive) cat. While cute, it's not a great survival mechanism. >.> (I have rehabbed and released other small wild things; my husband has not.) So we have a squirrel.

Rocky is now 8 weeks, very tame, almost litter box trained, has a decent recall that we're sharpening up, is eating rodent block as well as a variety of foods (and still nursing), and in general is a delight. I've spent hours on this forum and doing other research on squirrels and the best set ups for them and so on and so forth, although I'm sure I'm going to have plenty of questions. I also train animals for a living, and have worked with both domestic and wild animals, so I'm pretty confident on that front.

In fact, I have one here that I'll ask (and repost elsewhere if needed): what do people use for squirrel treats for training? So far I've been using Rocky's squirrel milk, but he won't be on that forever. His recall isn't good enough yet to do without a reward of some kind!

Looking forward to being part of this community,
Jenna and Rocky

[Cloudysunshine]

I'm planning on training my girl Tessa once her eyes open! Already have been calling her name and saying "yes!" a lot while she is eating her formula to get her associating her name and the word yes (clicker sound substitute) with food.

There's a rat food people recommend for squirrels that is shaped like little rectangles could be a good treat size. Or maybe low sugar berries like blueberry or strawberry. I've also read people giving their squirrels formula as a treat when they are adults, so a little drop of formula as a treat could work well. That would be fast too so they don't have to stop and eat something.
The Henry's blocks main ingredient is pecan, so maybe a tiny dab of pecan butter on the end of a popcicle stick.

It's been a while since you posted this, so please let me know what you've ended up doing!