WildView™

June 18, 2014

Super Rare Super Squirrel

- as seen by -

Peter Zahler

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What glides down mountains at night, sleeps in cliff caves during the day, eats primarily pine needles, and was thought to be extinct for 70 years? And, at four feet in length, is the biggest gliding mammal in the world?

The answer is the woolly flying squirrel – a mysterious creature I was lucky enough to “rediscover” in Pakistan in 1994. Our WCS Pakistan program now works with 65 communities and over 100 local rangers to save wildlife and forests in northern Pakistan – the only place the woolly flying squirrel has ever been found. Recently a captive woolly flying squirrel was delivered to the office – an amazing event given how few animals have ever been seen alive. They released this incredibly rare and endangered animal back to its mountain home, and this picture shows it in its moment of freedom, returning to the wild.

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