Know Your Quarry: Squirrel ID, Biology & Behavior Foundations

The Flying Squirrel (Not Game)

Lesson 4 of 41 · Module 1, lesson 4

Assumes the Hunting Primer. New here? Start there first.

Your objective

By the end, you'll be able to recognize a southern flying squirrel, explain why it isn't game, and interpret what its presence says about your hunting woods.

Concept ~6 min

Last light fades and a small shape launches off a high trunk, sails forty feet on outstretched skin, and lands soft on the next tree. You just watched a squirrel “fly.” It’s a southern flying squirrel — and it’s the one squirrel you’ll never hunt. Knowing it matters anyway, because it tells you something about the woods you’re standing in.

A different kind of squirrel

The southern flying squirrel (Glaucomys volans) is built nothing like a gray or a fox squirrel. Three things set it apart instantly:

Tiny. Body only about 5 to 6 inches — a fraction of a gray. It would fit in your palm.
Huge dark eyes, oversized for its head — the eyes of a night animal.
A loose fold of skin, the patagium (glide-membrane), running from front wrist to back ankle along each side, edged in dark hair.

It is soft gray-brown above with a clean white-to-cream belly, and a flattened tail it uses as a rudder in the air.

It glides — it doesn’t fly

Despite the name, a flying squirrel can’t truly fly. It glides: it leaps, spreads all four legs to stretch the patagium into a living parachute, and sails downward from a high launch to a lower landing — steering with its tail and the angle of the membrane. It’s a controlled drop, not powered flight.

Deep dive What it eats and where it dens

Flying squirrels feed heavily on nuts and acorns — especially hickory — plus seeds, berries, fungi, and even insects and eggs. They den in tree cavities, often old woodpecker holes, and will pack several animals into one cavity to stay warm. That dependence on cavity trees and mast is exactly why their presence tells you something about your woods (more on that below).

Why it isn’t game

You will essentially never encounter a flying squirrel during a legal squirrel hunt, and it isn’t pursued as game. Two reasons:

It’s nocturnal — active in the dark, hidden in a den cavity all through the daylight hours when you can legally hunt. By the time it’s out, legal shooting light is gone.
It’s tiny and not pursued for meat or fur — there’s simply nothing to hunt.

So the practical rule is simple: if you ever see one — at dusk, at a feeder, on a night trail-camera — leave it be. It isn’t your quarry.

What it tells you about the woods

Here’s why a non-game animal earns a lesson. The flying squirrel needs mature trees with cavities and a steady mast crop of acorns and hickory nuts. Those are the very same hardwoods — old, nut-heavy, full of den trees — that hold the huntable gray squirrels you’re after. Flyers present = a healthy mast woods = good gray-squirrel country. Read the schematic as that kind of mature stand. (Diagram, not a photo — real footage will replace it.)

Schematic woodland: a wooded ridge with simple trees and a person scanning upward into the canopy along a dashed sight line, suggesting a mature stand of timber. — Diagram: a mature, cavity-rich hardwood stand. Sign of flying squirrels here means good mast and good gray-squirrel habitat.

Tell it apart

These mix all three squirrels you’ve met. Answer each on its own.

Knowledge check

At dusk you glimpse a small squirrel — maybe 6 inches in the body, enormous eyes — sail from a high trunk to a lower one. What is it, and what do you do?

A southern flying squirrel — leave it; it's not game A young gray squirrel out late — take it A fox squirrel

Show answer

Correct: A southern flying squirrel — leave it; it's not game — Right. Tiny body, huge eyes, gliding at dusk — that's the flyer. It's nocturnal and not hunted. Recognize it and let it be.
Not quite: A young gray squirrel out late — take it — A gliding, big-eyed, palm-sized squirrel at dusk is a flying squirrel, not a young gray. It's not game — and you'd also be past legal light. Leave it.
Not quite: A fox squirrel — A fox squirrel is huge — about twice a gray and far bigger than this — and doesn't glide. A tiny gliding squirrel at dusk is the flyer. Not game.

Knowledge check

You're seeing flying-squirrel sign and old cavity trees in a stand of nut-heavy hardwoods. What does that tell a squirrel hunter?

It's a mature, mast-rich woods — likely good gray-squirrel habitat too Grays must be absent, since flyers outcompete them The area is poor for hunting and you should leave

Show answer

Correct: It's a mature, mast-rich woods — likely good gray-squirrel habitat too — Exactly. Flyers need cavity trees and steady mast — the same things that hold huntable grays. Their presence is a green flag for the woods.
Not quite: Grays must be absent, since flyers outcompete them — Not so — they share the habitat rather than excluding each other (and feed at different times of day). Flyer sign actually points to good gray country.
Not quite: The area is poor for hunting and you should leave — Opposite read. A cavity-rich, mast-heavy stand that supports flyers is exactly the kind of mature woods grays thrive in. Stay and scout it.

Take it to the woods

You won’t hunt the flyer, but you can use it as a scouting cue. On your next time in mature hardwoods, look for the signs of a healthy mast woods — old cavity trees, heavy nut crops, gnawed nutshells. If a trail-camera or a dusk sighting turns up a flyer, mark the spot: it’s likely strong daytime gray country.

Read the woods: flyer as a habitat cue

0/5

Be able to recognize a flyer: tiny body, huge eyes, glide-membrane, gliding at night/dusk.
Safety If you see one, leave it — it's not game. Off the menu, and you'd be past legal light anyway.
Note old cavity trees and woodpecker holes — den sign of a mature stand.
Check the mast: are oaks and hickories dropping a good nut crop?
Mark mast-rich, cavity-rich spots as likely daytime gray-squirrel habitat.

Sources

Animal Diversity Web — Glaucomys volans (southern flying squirrel): size, nocturnal habit, patagium, diet, cavity dens. https://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Glaucomys_volans/
National Wildlife Federation — Flying Squirrels (gliding, ecology). https://www.nwf.org/Educational-Resources/Wildlife-Guide/Mammals/Flying-Squirrels
Minnesota DNR — Flying squirrel (not hunted/trapped; no meat or fur value). https://www.dnr.state.mn.us/mammals/flyingsquirrel.html
Chesapeake Bay Program field guide — Southern flying squirrel. https://www.chesapeakebay.net/discover/field-guide/entry/southern-flying-squirrel

If you remember nothing else

The southern flying squirrel is tiny (about 5–6 in. body), nocturnal, with huge dark eyes and a loose skin glide-membrane (patagium).
It doesn't fly — it glides, stretching the membrane between wrist and ankle from tree to tree.
It isn't hunted: it's small, active only at night, and not pursued as game — you'll essentially never see one during legal squirrel hours.
Its presence signals a mature woods with cavity trees and abundant mast — the same hardwoods that hold huntable grays.
If you see a squirrel 'flying' at dusk or in a trail-camera at night, that's the flyer — leave it be.

How ready do you feel?

How ready are you to recognize a flying squirrel and explain why it's off the menu — and what it tells you about the woods?

Before you go — a quick look back

Distributed practice: one fast recall from an earlier lesson keeps it from fading.

Quick recall

From The Southern Fox Squirrel — what one feature, present in every color phase, marks a fox squirrel?

Show me the answer

Show answer

Correct: Show me the answer — The black facial mask with white nose, ears, and feet (plus its large size). Holding three species straight — gray, fox, flyer — is the whole point of this module: each has a tell that color can't hide.

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