Powerball jackpot<\/a>\u00a0and a lottery player continuing to play the numbers until they hit, squirrels do face substantial risk in betting big each year.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n“In some ways, this strategy of gambling with litter sizes is like playing with fire,” Petrullo said. “Because the average squirrel lifespan is 3.5 years and masts only happen every four to seven, a female could potentially be sabotaging her fitness by having too many babies in low-food years, hoping for a mast when she may die before she ever gets to experience a mast at all. This could be pretty costly.”<\/p>\n
However, Petrullo says it appears the red squirrels’ gambling strategy is currently the best bet in the Yukon.<\/p>\n
“It’s essentially impossible for a female to recuperate the fitness costs of not ramping up reproduction in a mast year, so the stakes are extremely high,” she concluded.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
North American red squirrels, new research finds, are quite skilled at gambling. University of Michigan biopsychology research fellow Dr. Lauren Petrullo recently discovered that North American red squirrels living in highly variable environments, such as the Canadian Yukon, regularly make big bets on the game of reproduction. Petrullo and her team discovered that North American […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":255083,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3313,18943],"tags":[13628,83186,82037,84665],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n
Squirrels Are Great Gamblers, University of Michigan Research Discovers<\/title>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\t\n