Copyright © 2007 McCleery, Lopez, Silvy.
Published by: Portuguese Wildlife Society
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Portugal License

• R. McCleery *
  Visiting assitant professor in the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Science
• R. Lopez *
  Associate professor in the department of Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences
• N. Silvy *
  Regents Professor in the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences

Abstract

Trapping and handling animals is an important aspect of wildlife research and management. Safety precautions to minimize the risk of injuries to wildlife researchers and animal subjects are mandated by state and federal laws. Use of a modified plastic funnel aided in researcher safety in a study of fox squirrels (Sciurus niger) on the Texas A&M University campus. Plastic funnels used in conjunction with canvas bags prevented animal bites or other injuries and simplified the handling and tagging of 175 fox squirrels. Studies employing the use of canvas bags with zippers for restraining squirrel-sized mammals should use the plastic funnel as an added safety precaution.

Keywords: handling, squirrels, safety, plastic funnel.

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