Pa guys, our squirrels have disappeared

I am in north central Pa and we had all sorts of squirrels , now none. Is it that there is just to much food in the woods this year? We have beech nuts every where, grapes apples and more apples, hickory nuts. We just had a great summer of rain every week and the place was green all summer long. Cut the grass all summer too of course. But the squirrels? Lots of road kill coon just showing up. Is it just here or a bigger area.......jk We do have a lot of fisher but not that many in my opinion

Plenty squirrels here, all colors. Our season is open, but no hard frost yet, no frost at all. Still picking tomatoes and peppers. I normally don't hunt them till after a frost or two.

Have you noticed any increases of Birds of Prey?

Have you noticed an influx of young men between the ages of 8-14? Carrying BB or pellet guns?

I'll let you knownif happening in northwest pa as well in a few days when i decide on a good day for my first bowhunting sit.

Around here they are everywhere, but only around the houses. Bird feeders! deer too. Go to the mountain and almost no deer or squirrels.

We still have them here in the NW. Lots of acorns right by my house so I see them often.

Carry in a tree stand and a bow with you. You will run out of ammo for the squirrels which will undoubtedly show up.

No squirrels here either. I went hunting once this year (early morning) and never saw or even heard a squirrel.


Also not getting any pics of squirrels on my game cams. Usually they are all over my deer feed.

Not as many squirrels around here, been that way for years.

Less here too. They used to practically be crawling on me when bow hunting.

when you have a red tail on every fence post , you only see squirrel in town

I watched a red tail come down and pick one up right in front of Point brewery in Stevens point some years ago so even in town they are not safe just safer

tons of gray squirrels in my county

Wherever we have fishers, we see dramatic reduction in squirrels, turkeys, rabbits. Our PA fisher trapping season is short by design, but the fishers eat 24/7/364. Apparently a female fisher lives in residence at our hunting camp close to JK. Every January-February she goes into heat and walks around the barn and cabin caterwauling so loudly she can be heard over woodworking machines. We have zero birds left, maybe 1-2 super skittish squirrels, and a large male bobcat that is super quick to come in to a predator call.
In Dauphin County a fisher moved into our farm three years ago and immediately the turkey and rabbit populations dropped like a rock.
Ok ok ok I know, I’m supposed to trap one of these fishers. I don’t know if other people are really lucky or really good, or if I’m really bad at trapping or just really unlucky, but despite targeting the one at camp, we have not caught her. Lot of close calls as we can see in the snow and on trail cams. She killed a porcupine very close to our main cubby set, ate it, left the carcass lay within sight. We will try again this winter, perhaps harder than the past two trapping seasons that we barely set much steel of any sort.
However, on the good side, plenty of squirrels are raiding bird feeders and gardens in urban areas.

Light bulb clicks on, caterwauling is what I've been hearing. Thanks Pal.
Kinda like bobcat but not the same?

I've seen and caught them here but don't play the silly tag, date and map games.
Bought the zoo tags one time and it threw my whole line/season off kilter.

I haven't seen hardly any for awhile now. Use to be they were all over the roads playing "hit me if you can" near walnut droppings.

Hadn't really give it much thought until mentioned, but yep, no squirrels.

Squirrels are still here.

The sqrs. in my area are down also. I live trapped a Red Fox in my yard two nights ago. We will see !

We still don't have a Fisher season in 1A. Why, I don't know.
I suspect that there's areas of PA where they should allow more than one to be taken.

Down in southern MD as well, we were just talking about it last week.

"caterwauling" That is a heck of a word, not sure if I have heard that before. Their screams (loud) are sort of similar to cats but the cats are high pitched and painful sounding. Now I have only heard the fishers twice though......jk

Not seeing many in Butler County or Centre County.

We use to float hunt a big creek and was easy to get a two man limit-16
Now can’t hardly scratch up a 1-man limit 8 in an all day float hunt

Still wondering how to pronounce the new to me word caterwauling.

Maybe the fisher thing was part of science based Quality Squirrel Management.

Pronounced catter-walling.
Good one about the squirrel management. Problem is the fishers are managing every other animal, too. They are voracious little beasts. A couple years ago the executive director of the PA Game Commission said at a public meeting that they had studied the stomachs of a bunch of fishers, and had found no Turkey meat inside. I responded “Of course you didn’t find any. The fishers ate all the turkeys a long time ago and there are hardly any left,” which got a good rousting jeer from the audience for the PGC folks. Who I do love. I just wish they’d figure out why we need ten fishers per square mile when just one will eat up most of the turkeys as it is.
Maybe a little longer fisher trapping season. Or a fisher hunting season with turkey decoys.

catter-walling,, got it.
I did notice a "few" less destructive chipmunks at my place.
Think a hog nosed snake or two is helping there.
I have nut trees, chippies come.
I'm due for more fisher pics on trail cam.
Seeing less but healthy looking squirrels.

Are you guys really from PA? LOL

Having had close ties to the Deutsch and Amish communities all my life I've heard the word katerwaulen (cry like a cat) used a lot. A caterwaul is a "disagreeable howling or screeching," like that of a cat in heat." It is frequently used to describe the tongue-lashing given by an angry housewife to a lazy husband.

I've never heard a fisher caterwauling but would love to. We have them in abundance around my camp in north-western Potter. Former Tman member PCR2 caught a huge one two seasons ago.

Lug when the women did that we called it,,, something different lol.

First time I heard a bobcat I was about 10 years old,
almost jumped outta my skin.
We weren't supposed to have those here.
More plentiful now.
Hearing reports of porcupines now, always changing.

This^^^

PCR2 What happened to him. I did not realize that he is missing. In my time on this site a LOT of people have just gone missing never to be heard of again......jk

He picked a fight with Paul one night and lost, lol.

That is a shame, because I needed to say I knew someone in Potter County, and PCR2 was it.
We are all guests here on this website, which I am confident requires a lot of time and patience to monitor and manage by its owner. This is pretty much the same on all websites that have a chat function. Some people have issues with authority, some people are their own worst enemy, and some people keep digging the hole they are in deeper and deeper. I know about all of this because I have all of these issues.
I will try to post the last couple of recordings I did of the lady fishercat when she was making her rounds here in late January. Long after fisher season had ended....

I have been trapping fishers for over 50 years and I open the stomach of every one that I catch. I have never found any sign of turkey in the contents. Unfortunately fishers are getting a bad rap in some quarters by people that don't know what they are talking about. If you want to see why small game is disappearing take a good look at coyotes.

Fisher man, I’m sure you know the ADKs. I’ve hunted there for many years, and I’ve enjoyed watching a huge coal-black male fisher hunting while I’m deer and bear hunting, and I’ve briefly seen others moving through the area I’m in. Very few places where a person can experience this. It’s great wild country there, and you are fortunate to be there and to be able to afford to live there.
When a person makes such a broad claim as you have here, along with an implied insult to those you disagree with, you persuade few and alienate most of your audience.
Those of us here in Northcentral PA know this area, and we believe we know what we are seeing. We being the vast majority of hunters I have contact with. Just the basic statistics show a very high correlation between an increasing fisher population and a dramatically plummeting turkey population.
Maybe we are wrong about this correlation. But we have always had a large coyote population that coexisted with a huge turkey population. What changed everything (turkeys, squirrels, porcupines, rabbits) was the introduction and explosive population growth of fishers.
I might be persuaded to see things differently, but it’s going to take a lot more than a blanket statement from a guy a hundred plus miles north of me in a different habitat with different trees etc So far I have been unpersuaded to see your same point of view by the PGC staff here. And I know I am in large company here. None of us wants to hate fishers, or demonize them. We just want some turkeys left on the landscape, and some squirrels and rabbits too. All of these things changed dramatically in a short time with the introduction of fishers.

I've always heard the talk of fisher decimating the turkey population and was always a bit skeptical.

Sort of like I am when hunters or landowners tell me that red fox are wiping out the local rabbit population. I know from reading the results of many studies that red fox primarily eat rodents, insects and plant matter in that order. Do they eat rabbits? I'm certain they do when they are lucky enough to catch one but I have serious doubts they are having any major impact on local populations.

So I was very excited to see the results when I heard that PA was conducting a fisher study and examining stomach contents of fishers.

There were 91 fishers collected between 2002 and 2014. The results were not that surprising to me when they showed that fisher do not prey heavily on turkey, only 12% had avian remains in their stomachs compared to 83% that had mammalian remains.

Here is a link to the explanation and results of that study.

Diets of fishers (Pekania pennanti) and evidence of intraspecific consumption in Pennsylvania.

Problem with this study, Lug, is it’s too little too late. The fishers were just getting going by 2002. By 2014 the Northcentral turkey populations were already crashing. There were too few for the fishers to eat. 91 stomachs is not a persuasive number indicative of the whole population. It was one of the few bad studies the PGC has done.

Lug, I've seen that study and I wonder if the stomach contents might have shown more evidence of poults if there had been a spring/summer portion of the study. I believe just about everything in the woods wants to eat young turkeys, but this study would not show that in the results.

I can't argue with that Redknot. It's a good point and the folks conducting the study, or at least those writing the results, admit that "carcass collection was biased toward fall/winter months so we did not consider seasonal effects on diet."

I do believe though that many folks consider fisher major predators of adult turkeys and that they are having a major impact on the population decline. I don't believe that and this study seems uphold my opinion.





I don't agree with all of this statement either. Mine is only an opinion but I do have some anecdotal evidence; The turkey population in my area of southeast PA has crashed as well, it started seven or eight years ago same as up north. We don't have a fisher population.

If I had to take a wild off the wall guess, I'd say they caught some disease from a chicken house/ crap spread in the fields.


Our Rabbits have RHD so the Game Comm. says.

squirrel have been found in fisher stomachs in my area of NW PA but they cant be doing that much damage

PAlltheway,

Please forgive me if I approached this subject in the wrong manner. It is not my intent to insult anyone.
Let me begin by stating that I am an Adirondack trapper, however I also own a second home in Clearfield County, Pa. and hunt and trap in Clearfield, Elk, and Jefferson counties. I am very thankful to trap in the Adirondacks, but I think Pennsylvania is a beautiful state as well.
I have read the Pennsylvania study and can find no specific reference to turkeys,unless they were part of the 12% avian remains.
Sadly when I'm in Pennsylvania I frequently hear from other sportsmen knocking the presence of fishers, and frequently that they are killing off the turkeys. That study, certainly indicates that is not true. The increase in fisher has nothing to do with the decrease in turkeys. Other, unknown factors are at work. We are seeing a decrease in Adirondack fishers; reason:unknown
again, please forgive me for getting off on the wrong foot. Fishers are my passion.

Lug, you have a fisher population in SE PA. I don't know if they are eating all your turkeys or just some of your turkeys, but they do eat turkeys, and they live just about everywhere in PA at this point. They are a neat animal. I am not on some anti fisher tirade. I am on a pro-turkey, pro small game hunting, pro natural-balance-as-much-as-possible tirade. The bottle was uncorked, these Tasmanian Devils were let loose, and I do not believe the PGC had a firm or even a slight grasp on what would result. Fishers seem to have bred and spread much more and much faster than anticipated. If the population were cut in half, no one would miss them, and they would continue eating everything they find. My question is, Do fishers eat rattlesnakes?
We are calling this past summer The Year of the Rattlesnake because there were SO MANY rattlers around. I ended up killing a large male and putting a tag on him, because he was hanging around the back steps and would rattle at people trying to enter and exit the house. I don't mind moving a couple snakes every summer, but this summer they were literally under foot, in the log piles, next to the house, next to the barn, on the trails, you name it. So...will fishers act like their mongoose cousins and eat these big rattlers?

I promised to assess NW pa if i got out hunting. I did. Saw no deer. Saw many chipmunks and at least 3 different gray squirrels. No fox. Heard reds but did not see. About normal for me.

Thanks and no problemo, Fisher Man. I appreciate the nice gesture. We are all trying to figure this out, you, me, and everyone who cares about trapping and hunting, and it does need to be figured out. The last thing I want to do is sound like the fisher version of the Deer Wars guys who claimed all the deer were gone, that the PGC had released wolves and mountain lions that had axe murdered the deer herds etc But I am also frustrated by what I believe to be a gaping hole in our biological sampling and field knowledge about this really pivotal animal. You are right, a lot of us in the northcentral blame fishers for the demise of our once enormous turkey populations. Why wouldn't we? We have not been persuaded by anything presented to us, and we are trusting our eyes and ears more than anything that has been shown to us by the professional wildlife managers we revere and adore. It is not a personal attack, we are just frustrated and sad. Not too too long ago, I could sit in the living room and watch three different flocks of wild turkeys rotate through the clover lawn on any given day. Or watch them feed on acorns in the same manner. Now...if I see one or two turkeys ALL YEAR it is big news. I have fresh fisher tracks right below the house here, in the mud, as well as occasional bobcat, fox, and coyote tracks. Very infrequent turkey prints...the only factor new to the equation is the fisher.
Anyhow, happy trapping and hunting to you this season. I hope you get a pile o' fishers!

If there are as many fisher as you believe perhaps the PGC should increase the length of your season and the amount you can take.
Don't want to stick my nose in Pa. politics.
Here in New York we have our own problems too. our DEC is so political and condescending that no real improvements are taking place, due mostly in part by one arrogant, know it all regional wildlife manager.

P.S. I think your rattlers are safe from population reduction from the fishers.
Have a good day.

I'm right across the border from McKean County, Pa. The fisher population has really increased here from the PA population. I see more fisher tracks that fox and coyotes combined. See them regularly while bowhunting and release several a year while trapping coyotes. The insanity here in NY is we are given a 6 day (4 checks) season with no bag limit in late Oct. when those skins are as blue as the sky. I'd rather see them move that December.

SW Pa we have a good population of greys,reds and some fox squirrels in some areas also. We have a good fisher population locally but no season yet in our zone. I see tracks in the snow in many areas that I travel thru the season checking traps.

No doubt there is a small population SEPA. I know they have been spotted ninety minutes north of me. But in my area, lets say large parts of two Counties that I consider my stomping grounds, I am confident they do not exist or are in such small numbers that they would have no impact on any prey population. If they were here in any numbers I would know it, I'd see them and their sign and I might even catch some. All those things happen around my camp in NW Potter (my other stomping grounds), I see them and their sign and they are caught all the time.

I also don't doubt they will eat turkeys, especially poults. But I stand firm on my opinion that they are not a major predator of turkeys.




I agree they are a neat animal, a very efficient predator. I always admired mink for those same qualities. I am also pro-turkey (Spring Gobbler is my favorite hunt) and pro-small game. And I agree that releasing fisher was a mistake. There are good reasons our forefathers eliminated predators. Reintroducing them is not a good idea. When I was a kid and just starting hunting fifty years ago the mindset was still to eliminate predators and every one that presented the opportunity was killed, domestic, winged or otherwise. We had a huge small game population back then.

do you have a lot of hmong in the area or that come to hunt the area? they will decimate the squirrel population. around here the public lands are pretty scarce of squirrels because of it

As Archeryguy stated, the fisher season in NY's southern tier counties during October is the tops in stupidity. One biologist stated that those blue fisher are "still saleable". DEC seems to be pushing catching a fisher as a "trophy" versus catching valuable furbearer when it is prime and at it's best. What kind of management is that?
In my area of the Adirondacks DEC's answer to a decline was to shorten the season, but on the WRONG END. DEC chooses to ignore trapper input and even their own St.Lawrence County study which showed no negative affects from a later season. Pennsylvania has it right with a December season.. It seems to me that DEC wants all seasons to run the same for their convenience without consideration of when is the best time to harvest our furbearers.