The nut this squirrel stole had a camera in it

Name: The nut this squirrel stole had a camera in it
Uploaded: 2019-09-10T16:00:07Z
Duration: 4 min 13 s
Description: Squirrels bury nuts to get through the winter, and they go about it as if nobody is watching. This time somebody is, and it's a robot squirrel full of hidden cameras.

Squirrels bury nuts to get through the winter, and they go about it as if nobody is watching. This time somebody is, and it's a robot squirrel full of hidden cameras. more

The robot is called Spy Squirrel, and it was built for the BBC series Spy in the Wild. Next to the real thing it looks a little scruffy, like a squirrel out of a Stephen King story. The real squirrels have no time to judge. They have food to hide.

Two squirrels on a tree branch, one above the other, against a blurred green background. A headline runs in white letters across the lower third. — Real squirrels get to work hiding food for the winter.

A lot of it, too. Each autumn a squirrel buries around 10,000 nuts and can find up to 4,000 of them again. As winter gets close, the part of the brain that handles memory grows by 15 percent. David Tennant, the Doctor Who actor, does the telling.

One real squirrel sizes up the robot first, lashing and fluffing his tail to look bigger. Spy Squirrel turns out to be "a pushover," and the nut it offers is stashed away at once. But another squirrel is watching where it goes. As soon as it is buried, she digs it up.

Two gray squirrels sit among fallen leaves. One holds food and the other looks toward it. A headline runs in white letters across the lower third. — A nut in one squirrel's paws already has another squirrel's full attention.

Stealing works fine until you get caught. She gets caught, and a chase follows.

The squirrel who was robbed gets craftier. With the thief maybe still watching, he puts on "a shameless display of overacting" and pretends to bury his nut. She waits for the show to end, then sneaks in and finds nothing, because the nut is in his mouth.

She hasn't given up her life of crime. Spy Squirrel has a new nut, and she takes it. This time, though, the thief has picked the wrong nut, because this one has a tiny camera inside.

A squirrel holding an acorn outdoors with blurred foliage, likely autumn. The headline runs in white letters across the lower third. — Squirrels bury nuts to get through the winter, and they go about it as if nobody is watching.

Around a fifth of all squirrels steal nuts instead of finding their own. Anyone who has seen two squirrels tearing across a lawn and figured they were playing tag may want to think again. Some of those chases look a lot more like a robbery.