Hard mast is another name for a nut crop such as acorns, hickory nuts, or beech nuts. These trees must be of the proper age to produce mast. Generally, trees have to be 25 to 30 years old to produce nuts. Oaks, hickory, and beech do not produce a good crop of nuts each year. Because of this tendency, it is good to have a mix of these species and different types of each species to guard against a mast failure.
Gray squirrels eat a wide variety of seasonal plant foods.
Learn to recognize these plants so they can be saved during construction, wood cutting, or other forest activities. A list of the seasonal foods squirrels seem to prefer is shown below. Chinquapin Tupelo gum Grape Witchhazel Greenbrier Common Cavity Trees Used For Squirrel Dens Ash Maple Bald cypress Oak Beech Sassafras Blackgum Sweetgum Hickory Sycamore Nest Sites. Try to provide two to six good den sites per acre. Research shows that gray squirrels rarely use more than 50 percent of available cavity sites, so you should probably double these figures.