How Many Squirrels Are In Central Park? Now We Know

CENTRAL PARK, NY — They amble across paths, scurry up trees and might approach passersby for a snack. Squirrels are everywhere in Central Park, but their exact numbers have long been elusive.

That's no longer the case, thanks to the Squirrel Census. The city's most famous green space is home to an estimated 2,373 Eastern gray squirrels, according to the first-ever definitive count of the critters.

The results show that Central Park is a "healthy and typical place to be a squirrel," said Jamie Allen, the Atlanta-based writer who created the census. But the number is always in flux because squirrels still live "pretty tough lives," he said.

"If we were able to count all the squirrels all at once in a single day in Central Park, the next day that number might change," Allen said. "So it’s a fluid number but this is as close as you can get to an estimate of the squirrel population, in Central Park or any green space."

The census team released the results of its squirrely undertaking on Thursday, along with one of the most comprehensive maps of Central Park ever made. The census report and other revealing squirrel-related materials are available online for $75.

The project employed more than 300 volunteer "squirrel sighters" who were assigned to count squirrels in a particular section of the park. They were also asked to note the animals' age, the color of their fur and how they behaved around humans, along with notes about Central Park in general, Allen said.

Part of the purpose of the census was "getting people to see their urban green spaces in a completely different way," Allen said. Some squirrel-sighters said they saw parts of the park or things within it that they had not seen before, he said.

"It's just a matter of slowing down for a minute and seeing the park through a different lens," Allen said.

The census used a counting methodology established by Vagn Flyger, a wildlife biologist who spent his career studying squirrels. The park was divided into 350 hectares where squirrels can hang out, Allen said. The results from the observational count were then put into a formula Flyger created that generates a highly accurate number, he said.

The census indicates that squirrels are even more abundant in Central Park than the Atlanta neighborhood of Inman Park, where Allen's team did counts in 2012 and 2016. Each of Central Park's hectares has an average of 6.78 squirrels, while the last count of Inman Park found 6.1 squirrels per hectare on average, Allen said.

The census also revealed that the squirrels in the lungs of Manhattan have "their own unique quilt of colors," Allen said, from cinnamon fur to jet black.

"They look different than any other squirrels I've seen, and it’s because Central Park is an island and they can’t get off, and other squirrels can’t get on," he said. "... There's not outside squirrels coming in and influencing their fur pattern, and so it's evolving in its own direction."

While humans have counted animals that are going extinct, Allen said, not much is known about Eastern gray squirrels because they're so common.

"It’s interesting to me that there’s this animal that not only thrives with us, in a city — like literally stands right next to us — but is doing so independently, and they actually don’t need us at all," Allen said.