What? A Purple Squirrel?

reply to post by DerbyCityLights


I don't know nature's purpose for the purple, but biologists are surprised to find out the white ones are no more susceptible to predators than any other color. Its an odd thing, you would think hawks and owls and larger mammals would spot them a mile away and kill them off quickly, but it doesn't happen? Maybe the purple color is something predators don't immediately recognize as food?
'
You know, Florida has the Pink Flamingos too. It has something to do with their diet, but apparently it doesn't cause them any extra survival trouble.

And no, I don't think they are albinos, because albinos affect a small percentage of normal squirrels, but I think these are just white squirrels. Yep, wiki agrees, not albino, just white.

reply to post by getreadyalready


Im still wondering why more animals havent evolved full on camo on their fur

Or why some animals haven't evolved invisibility.
Or maybe they have and they are all around us without our knowing!

Maybe purple is some evolutionary trait,

purple camo,so you can hide in the ultraviolet waves soon to hit the planet.

Originally posted by getreadyalready
reply to post by DerbyCityLights

 

I don't know nature's purpose for the purple, but biologists are surprised to find out the white ones are no more susceptible to predators than any other color. Its an odd thing, you would think hawks and owls and larger mammals would spot them a mile away and kill them off quickly, but it doesn't happen? Maybe the purple color is something predators don't immediately recognize as food?

'
You know, Florida has the Pink Flamingos too. It has something to do with their diet, but apparently it doesn't cause them any extra survival trouble.

And no, I don't think they are albinos, because albinos affect a small percentage of normal squirrels, but I think these are just white squirrels. Yep, wiki agrees, not albino, just white.

Maybe the whites are for adapting to the co-habitation with humans,or just some weird genetic mutation that wont last long.

That white and purple squirrel look sooo adorable. So beautiful.

The squirrel was released


Purple squirrel released back into the wilderness

As for why the squirrel was purple, Buzzfeed pointed out that a purple squirrel found in England in 2008 spurred debate among vets and nature experts.

"I have never seen anything like it before," wildlife expert Chris Packham told the Telegraph at the time. "Squirrels will chew anything even if it's obviously inedible. It is possible he has been chewing on a purple ink cartridge and then groomed that coloring into his fur."

But the squirrel's uniform color would seem to rule out the paint theory. Krish Pillai, a professor at Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania, commented on Accuweather.com that the squirrel's color should not be taken lightly:

This is not good at all. That color looks very much like Tyrian purple. It is a natural organobromide compound seen in molluscs and rarely found in land animals. The squirrel has too much bromide in its system possibly from all the bromide laced frack water it's been drinking. I would raise the alarm. This could mean bladder cancer for humans down the road.

Originally posted by getreadyalready
reply to post by DerbyCityLights

 

I don't know nature's purpose for the purple, but biologists are surprised to find out the white ones are no more susceptible to predators than any other color. Its an odd thing, you would think hawks and owls and larger mammals would spot them a mile away and kill them off quickly, but it doesn't happen? Maybe the purple color is something predators don't immediately recognize as food?

'

That is surprising to me as well. I would have thought that it made them stick out like a sore thumb. I guess not. It makes me question just what predators are looking for when hunting for food. Maybe it is movement they see first...But still... I would think that a moving white rodent is more noticeable than a moving brown one or what have you.

I am trying to think of reasons it may have a purple color. Thinking about environment, survival of the fittest and all that. I can only think of things that tie into surviving I.E being harder to be recognized as food.

But then there are non natural possibilities. Such as what the post above suggests. Perhaps it groomed something into it's fur that dyed/stained it that color...

I just don't know. Very interesting.

why would this not be possible..
I have seen white and black ones..
and cute?.. until it decides to eat your nuts

reply to post by gimme_some_truth


Well,think about birds and insects with the wide range of colors.
Why isn't hair or fur as varied?

Natural Color Main article: Human hair color All natural hair colors are the result of two types of hair pigment. Both of these pigments are melanin types, produced inside the hair follicle and packed into granules found in the fibers. Eumelanin is the dominant pigment in dark-blond, brown, and black hair, while pheomelanin is dominant in red hair.[5] Blond hair is the result of having little pigmentation in the hair strand. Gray hair occurs when melanin production decreases or stops.

en.wikipedia.org...

Coloration Colors resulting from different feather pigments Left: turacin (red) and turacoverdin (green, with some structural blue iridescence at lower end) on the wing of Tauraco bannermani Right: carotenoids (red) and melanins (dark) on belly/wings of Ramphocelus bresilius The colors of feathers are produced by the presence of pigments, or by microscopic refractive structures, or by a combination of both. Most feather pigments are melanins (brown and beige pheomelanins, black and grey eumelanins) and carotenoids (red, yellow, orange); other pigments occur only in certain taxa – the yellow to red psittacofulvins[21] (found in some parrots) and the red turacin and green turacoverdin (porphyrin pigments found only in turacos). Structural coloration[4][22][23] is involved in the production of blue colors, iridescence, most ultraviolet reflectance and in the enhancement of pigmentary colors; structural iridescence has been reported[24] in fossil feathers dating back 40 million years. White feathers lack pigment and scatter light diffusely; albinism in birds is caused by defective pigment production, though structural coloration will not be affected (as can be seen e.g. in blue-and-white budgerigars). A feather with no pigment For example, the blues and bright greens of many parrots are produced by constructive interference of light reflecting from different layers of the structures in feathers, in the case of green plumage in addition to the yellow pigments; the specific feather structure involved is sometimes called the Dyck texture.[25][26] Melanin is often involved in the absorption of some of the light; in combination with yellow pigment it produces dull olive-greens.

en.wikipedia.org...

I think someone colored this poor squirrel.

Or,if anyone has ever done any plumbing working with pvc,you have a primer that looks just like that color,cause it doesn't come off,from experience.
I will leave it on the deck of my pool and it wouldn't surprise me that he dumped it on himself.

reply to post by kdog1982


I am quite familiar with the purple PVC pre-treatment cleaner.

That stuff has a very strong chemical odor and I doubt any animal would go near it.

This article suggests it could come from water that's been contaminated by fracking

Bromine is found naturally in seawater and is mostly harmless by itself, Matt Fair explained in the New Jersey Times. But when combined with chemicals like chlorine, it can form dangerous compounds called brominated trihalomethanes, which studies have linked to cancer and birth defects.

Unfortunately, high levels of chlorine and bromine have been recorded in drilling wastewater created by hydraulic fracking, which is practiced throughout Pennsylvania, according to the Scranton Times Tribune.

In Pittsburgh, about 200 miles from the city where the purple squirrel was found, high trihalomethane levels are already a problem.

"Suffice it to say, [trihalomethanes] cause cancer and (can cause genetic mutation)," Conrad Volz, director of the Center for Health, Environments, and Community at the University of Pittsburgh, told the New Jersey Times. "We have a problem here in Pittsburgh already that the trihalomethane level in finished drinking water is now about ready to go ... higher than the drinking water standards. That's been happening in many areas of western Pennsylvania."

There is a simple explanation for this purple squirrel . The photograph was taken with the wrong white balance selected . Probably florecent !

No mystery here !

reply to post by MathiasAndrew



You would think that if the coloration was due to fracking, there would be more than one instance of this and it would be across many animals.

Ok so there was a dragon seen in china, a wolly maommoth in a river, and now a purple squirrel... I better keep my camera ready just in case unicorn wanders by

Originally posted by Teeky
Ok so there was a dragon seen in china, a wolly maommoth in a river, and now a purple squirrel... I better keep my camera ready just in case unicorn wanders by

Shoot it!

With the camera of course.

I think the mammoth was a hoax, it was a bear with a fish, out of focus, in a trash paper. The dragon just looked like clouds to me, nothing special.

At least the purple squirrel is REAL!

reply to post by Iamschist


That's exactly what it looks like to me. To me, this squirrel does not look purple. It's a common grey squirrel. However, this thread does remind me of a story.

When I was in high school, we had an exchange student from Germany. Anyway, one day a group of us were hanging out at the local university campus which was close to our school. The university has lots of squirrels who aren't afraid of humans and will come up to anyone who is eating food. A guy in our group started feeding the squirrels and the exchange student got very agitated and concerned saying, 'Get away! They're diseased! You'll get rabies!' It turns out, he had never seen a grey squirrel before and was used to red ones.

Originally posted by Lil Drummerboy
why would this not be possible..
I have seen white and black ones..
and cute?.. until it decides to eat your nuts

Ha! Not a squirrel fan myself. Unless its in the pot. A little stringy and a b--ch to skin, but pretty dang good if cooked right.

One of the girls at work has purple hair.

I wonder if there is a connection?

Originally posted by kdog1982
Any colloidal silver in the drinking water?

Paul Karason puts a whole new spin on "feeling blue.” For more than a decade, the 57-year-old has been living with a blue face. Fourteen years ago, Karason developed a bad case of dermatitis, which results in swollen, reddened and itchy skin. He started self-medicating, using a treatment called colloidal silver, which is made by extracting silver from metal. Click here to hear the blue man tell his story (VIDEO) Often touted by manufacturers as a cure-all, colloidal silver usually is found in a liquid form. Looking for relief, Karason drank the concoction and rubbed it on his skin — something the U.S. Food and Drug Administration does not recommend. His skin slowly turned blue. Read more: www.foxnews.com...

www.foxnews.com...

This clown is well known for showing the side effects of over using silver nitrates consumed and splashed over his face, instead of using the "bought" stuff he decided he could make his own cheap colloidal silver in his back yard. This is the result, when making colloidal silver there is a process so you dont end up with the nitrates in solution which he clearly did not follow.