For this study question, please solidify what your two (at least) hypotheses will be for our first paper on squirrel behavior. These should be based on two behaviors that you’ve selected to compare between the two seasons. Each hypothesis should be one-tailed. Please give rationale as to why you are predicting your hypotheses as such (if it’s based on reading we’ve done, mention the source as well).
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For my two behaviors to compare to summer and winter weather i chose running and sitting. My hypotheses are 1. Squirrels spend more time running in the summer than winter, and 2. Squirrels spend more time sitting in winter than summer. I’m predicting these hypotheses because i think squirrels are more active in the summer, searching for food and hiding it to prepare for the winter months and move in a quicker pace this way. During the winter i think squirrels will sit more, only moving to gather food where they will sit to eat. I think they will not be in any rush to run anywhere, and will also conserve their energy and body fat with less movement.
I’m changing “sitting” to “walking”. I reread the behavior example and think differently about it now. My second hypothesis is that squirrels will spend more time walking in winter than summer. Again i think the same reason is that they are conserving energy in winter months.
Update. I have a change of heart again with my second hypothesis. So let me start over. For my first hypothesis i am stating that squirrels spend more time running in the summer. My thoughts on this are that they are spending time gathering and hiding food, and moving at a quick pace from place to place. My second hypothesis is that squirrels spend more time searching in the winter. They are now in need to eat to sustain energy for the colder weather, so they will spend most of the winter months searching for food to eat.
Our research provided us with various questions regarding the behavior of squirrels in relation to weather. Because squirrels “tail flick” in the presence of danger or to send warning signals to fellow conspecifics, I believe that squirrels would tail flick more often in the summer than in the winter. The crowdedness of Central Park during the summer and warm weather would allow me to assume that squirrels feel more at danger with an increased population of people in the area. Similarly, squirrels use vocal signals, such as “chattering” or “chirping” as a means of alarming other squirrels when they are in a dangerous situation. This led me to my second hypothesis: squirrels chatter and chirp more often in the summer than the winter.
Hi Afifa,
I find your hypotheses very interesting, especially that of the tail flick. Personally, I did not know the reason behind that behavior, but as you stated it in your hypothesis, it sounds like a strong and reasonable assumption. I look forward to seeing what you find when we get the statistics on Tuesday.
Hi Afifa!
I love how you connected both of your hypotheses as they both reference “danger.” That should be interesting to see how they also relate in circumstances as well. I believe it’s a strong idea because specifically in America, or even deeper, NYC, squirrels are active rodents who encounter danger everyday. Whether it be pedestrians passing by, competition for food or even almost getting run over by a moving vehicle, squirrels are actively engaged with the environment and danger around them.
Hey Afifa, just wanted to say I agree with your idea that squirrels would tail flick more during the summer than the winter due to the fact that there are definitely more people out and about in the summer. I actually had a similar hypothesis where squirrels are more likely to freeze while you say chirp to allow them to be wary of any incoming danger.
The two behaviors I am choosing for my paper are chirping and flicking. The hypotheses I have come up with are as follows:
(1)Squirrels will chirp more in colder seasons due to their breeding times. Squirrels seem to use chirping as a mechanism to communicate with one another. I believe that this chirping will be much more common during the seasons that they are breeding. The chirping could be a number of possibilities ranging from warning others of a dangerous situation, to scaring off predators if their offspring are in danger. (2) Squirrels will flick their tail more in warmer seasons due to there being more civilians and other animals outside. The flicking of their tails can be a warning sign to other squirrels. They could be telling others that the caches are being threatened. It could also be anxiety driven, being that there are much more civilians and other animals in their living environment in warmer seasons.
Hi Jennie,
I think your hypotheses are really interesting. I like your ideas about how there could be different reasons for their tail flicking, especially how it could be anxiety driven. Great job, i’m interested in seeing what you find!
-Kaitlyn
Hey Jennie,
I personally am a huge fan of abnormal psychology so the fact that you mentioned anxiety in squirrels got me quickly intrigued. I can see why you say that they might get anxiety. Squirrels might get intrusive thoughts, or feel very concerned when there are more threats around.
-Loraine
Hello everyone,
Based on the observations of grey squirrels in Central Park on February 1st, my first hypothesis is that grey squirrels forage more in the summer in preparation for the winter when food availability is significantly scarce. Also, they dig and store more food in the summer. As for my second hypothesis, I expect grey squirrels to rest and eat more in the winter than in the summer. I anticipate this because due to the cold weather and the lack of food to collect, squirrels may spend more time resting to keep themselves warm and eating the food they stored in the summer.
Hi Peter,
You have good rationale for your hypotheses, I just want to make a note that you have listed 2 behaviors per each hypotheses. This is totally fine but just keep in mind that you will have to report results on each of these (separate results for rest and eat which are both part of your 2nd hypothesis). Then, for your first hypothesis, you have forage, which isn’t a specific behavior that we recorded during our study. I see that you are considering dig and store as foraging, but just make sure you are being clear on how you are defining these terms in your introduction. Your hypothesis should focus on the specific behaviors we observed (so on digging) and then in your paper, you can talk about digging as a foraging behavior more broadly. Does that make sense?
The two behaviors that I have selected to compare between summer and winter are running and caching. My first hypothesis is that squirrels run more in the summer than they do during the winter. My rationale for this hypothesis is that during the winter, squirrels are not that active due to the cold weather and would rather keep warm in their shelters. Also, since there isn’t much food available during the winter, squirrels would rather keep warm in one location rather than spend time outside trying to find food that is hard to come by. This observation led to my second hypothesis. My second hypothesis is that squirrels cache more during the winter than in the summer. Since it is hard to find food in the cold weather, squirrels search more and try to gather as much food as they can so they can save it up for the spring and summer. They dig the food they find in the winter, so they can eat it in the spring and summer. Squirrels store food for later and maximize whatever they have on their hands now, so they won’t be hungry during the spring and summer months.
Hi Elif,
I found your two hypotheses very interesting. I agree that squirrels would want to prevent themselves from freezing in cold temperatures, but I’ve always imagined that they would be found running, as opposed to walking, more in the winter than the summer to keep themselves active and warm. Your hypothesis made me see the situation in a different way; it is possible that most squirrels would rather stay in shelters than run outside during the winter.
The two squirrel behaviors I will be comparing for the winter and summer seasons are climbing and freezing. My hypothesis are that 1. squirrels will climb more in the summer than the winter. I believe this is because they seek refuge in trees to eat food during the summer away from the higher number of pedestrians and kids about in the park. 2. Squirrels freeze more in the summer than the winter. I believe in the summer there will be more more wild life about outside due to abundant sources of food. Therefore, squirrels will freeze in order to better listen to their surroundings and stay alert for any potential signs of danger .
Hi Jessica,
I agree with your hypothesis that squirrels will spend more time freezing in the summer in order to better adjust to the environment around them and become successful in finding food. I also agree with your hypothesis that squirrels will spend a lot of time climbing during the summer in order to find more food. When we were observing the squirrels in Central Park, the squirrels were not climbing many trees and if they did, they just stayed on that tree (well at least that’s what the squirrels my partner and I observed did!)
My hypotheses would be firstly that squirrels cache more often during the summer than the winter, and secondly, consume more during the winter than the summer. My reasoning for the second hypothesis is derived from the Hopewell article, which detailed the squirrels’ mating behaviors in comparison to body weight. On average, the females’ body weight increases to accommodate for babies, which may have been a result of increased food intake, hence they eat more in the winter. The first hypothesis was inferred from the fact that the squirrels tend to reduce heir activities during the winter, therefore they must be gathering and caching over the summer, in tandem with other animals that hibernate.
Hi Jimmy,
This is a good start but you want your hypotheses to directly reflect the behaviors we measured. It is fair to expect that they will cache more often in the summer, but which behavior from the ones we specifically observed can you focus on that would be related to that caching behavior? The same goes for ‘consuming’. Which behavior will you focus on for consuming?
For this study, I chose to focus on eating and digging behaviors in eastern gray squirrels. My first hypothesis (1) asserts that eastern gray squirrels will eat more frequently in the winter than the summer, as they had stored away food to survive the cold months. My second hypothesis (2) is that the eastern gray squirrels will demonstrate more frequent digging in the winter months while retreiving food to eat that they had cached earlier in the year.
This is quite interesting because I’d assume that the squirrels would eat more in the summer being that its more convenient and likely to find food. I like that you focused on their eating habits as they aren’t like usual eating habits as other animals during the winter time.
The two behaviors I have chosen to compare for this paper are searching and chirping. I am predicting that squirrels will spend more time searching in the summer in order to find and store food for the winter. Even with an abundance of food, they still need to search for a source and stock up. I also predict that squirrels will spend chirp more in the summer due to weather factors, increased access/abundance of food and overall increase activity amongst the squirrels leading to a need for a means of communication, leading to an increase in chirping.
For this research I have decided to pick resting and climbing. Based on the observations I made, I found that squirrels rest more during the winter than the summer. This is because I believe that during the summer, squirrels are probably more active and search more for food than they do in winter. There is typically abundance in food during summer as well, which is why they will rest less during this period. Resting was also something I tallied the most on the behavior chart during the observations. Second factor is climbing. I think squirrels will climb more during the summer than winter in order to seek shade or protection from the environment, which will be less during winter.
Our first hypothesis is that squirrels climb more in the summer than winter because there is more food available in the summer hence they need to go back and forth to pick up and store the food in their nests. Our second hypothesis is that squirrels flick their tails more in the summer than the winter because there is more competition and they try to scare off predators and competitors.
For this study, my two hypotheses are: squirrels climb more in the summer than the winter and squirrels tail flick more in the summer than the winter. For my first hypothesis, squirrels climb more in the summer than in the winter as they readily scavenge for food on the ground to store for the colder months. With them doing so, they are able to collect more food to store in their nests for the winter. Thus, squirrels will climb to their nest more often to gather and store food in warmer temperatures as they prepare for future meals. Additionally, for my second hypothesis, squirrels tail flick more in the summer than in the winter because since there is more food available in the summer, this also means there are more squirrels and also more competition among them for food. Tail flicking is a tactic used by squirrels to threaten others so they can successfully gather their food. Thus, tail flicking is done more often in the summer than winter as the competition for food is at a high peak.
After observing the squirrels in Central Park I have come up with many possible hypotheses based on their behavior. Two that have stuck out to me the most are climbing and eating. My first hypothesis states that squirrels will climb more in the winter because they are searching for food. It was evident that one of the main reasons why these squirrels were out in the cold was that they needed to find food for themselves. In the summer, squirrels can occupy themselves doing different behaviors like saltating to a different piece of land or freezing because of the many people around on a summers day. My other hypothesis is that squirrels eat more in the Summer than Winter. I say this because in the summer season, not only is the weather more pleasing but it also allows trees who provide food to blossom, therefore having an influx of food.
The 2 behaviors I have chosen to compare between the summer and winter are freezing and resting behavior. I hypothesize that in the winter squirrels freeze more because there is less foliage in the trees and less activity in the area to camouflage their movements. I also hypothesize that there is more resting behavior in the winter because there is a lesser demand to be actively seeking new food sources and there is a need for energy conservation.
The two behaviors I took an interest in was freezing and running. My hypothesis is that squirrels will freeze more in the summer than the winter. I came up with this hypothesis when I saw a squirrel freeze when a dog appeared in the vicinity. The freezing behavior could be the squirrel being alerted and entered a fight or flight response. The park is more active in the summer and squirrels might display the freeze behavior more frequently. My other hypothesis is that squirrels will run more in the summer. Based on the same idea that when there are more people and dogs, squirrels will be on alert and fleet the area. Summer is also the time squirrels need to compete for nuts in preparation for the winter.
We observed squirrels in the beginning of the semester and how their behavior affects what they do, with that I have come up with two hypotheses. My first hypothesis is that squirrels freeze more during the summer rather than the winter due to the amount of people that are outside. Freezing would suggest that the squirrels are alert and cautious of humans nearby. My second hypothesis is that squirrels are more likely to dig for food and store it right before winter rather than the summer, due to the fact that they would have to hibernate during winter and then they come out in spring and have their food caches for eating.
The two behaviors I decided to analyze were searching and eating. I believe that in the winter months squirrels will spend more time eating as compared to searching and in the summer months squirrels will spend more time searching than eating. The reasoning behind my hypotheses are that in the winter squirrels will spend their time eating the food they stored away in the summer since there is a scarce supply of food in the winter months and in the summer since their is an abundance of food as compared to in the winter squirrels will spend most of their time searching for places to store their food away.
Before observing the data for the differences between squirrel behaviors in the winter and summer seasons I would like to compare two behaviors. My first behavior and hypothesis is that squirrels will search for food less in the summer season rather than in the winter. I believe this hypothesis could be true because there is a greater scarcity of food in the area so the search and necessity to eat could be higher in the cold season. The second hypothesis is that squirrels rest more in the winter seasons. In order to conserve energy, the squirrels could spend more time finding shelter and resting.
Based on the observations that I made at Central Park I have come to the hypothesis that Squirrels spen more time frozen in the Winter than they do in the summer. I was able to rationalize this because the Hopewell squirrels article claimed that squirrels did not weight during periods of food availability. I hypothesized that this is because they spend more of their time from frozen during period of poor food availability like winter. My second hypothesis is that squirrels spend more time foraging for food in the summer. Both of these hypothesis would require a one tailed T-test.
After observing squirrels at central park, We came up with two hypothesis. Our first hypothesis was that since squirrels climb more in the summer than the winter and our second hypothesis was that squirrels flick their tails more in the summer than the winter. Since there is more food available in the summer and squirrels are gathering more food so they can store for winter and since there is more food available in the summer there is more competition to get food so squirrels flick their tail more.