Okay. Best guess: What is this?
If your hand shot up and you shouted: “That’s the lower jaw of an elk and those holes are where its front teeth used to be!” go right to the head of the class.
This bone sits on a pile in our yard. On rambles through the woods we’ve picked up jawbones, vertebrae, ribs, skulls, shoulder blades, pelvises, teeth and long bones.
Not sure why. Kind of a packrat thing.
Red tree squirrels love it all. It’s where they come when they need a calcium hit.
Squirrels, like us, need calcium for strong bones.
They get it from several places — eggshells (think birds’ nests), mushrooms (fresh or dried, which they dry themselves), other plants, insects and bones.
Note the fresh white scratches on this bone: Squirrel nibblings.
Me? I prefer milk.
Elk Cervus canadensis
Red tree squirrel Tamiasciurus hudsonicus
The Lens and I 