Lakesia Butler and her 8-year-old daughter, Torrie, stopped at the A&M Peanut Shop in downtown Mobile on Monday to purchase a bag of peanuts and head over to Bienville Square for an afternoon of squirrel feeding.

“My kid loves it,” said Butler, 31, of Mobile.

It’s a general tradition shared by generations of Mobilians. But questions about the Eastern gray squirrel that populates the park are surfacing ahead of the Mobile City Council’s vote next week on a $3.2 million park overhaul to the nearly 200-year-old Bienville Square.

The most disturbing of them: Are the mothers castrating their young?

“Every one of the males we removed were castrated,” said Michael Niemeyer Jr. of Fairhope-based Wildlife Solutions.

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Niemeyer was hired in late 2021 to trap and remove about two dozen squirrels from the park due to concerns from city officials about an overpopulation of the furry mammals destroying trees and chewing wires.

The concerns have been relayed to Mobile officials, including the Downtown Mobile Alliance, which is spearheading the revitalization efforts to the historic park following damages it sustained from Hurricane Sally in 2020.

“It’s an uncomfortable truth but that is what is happening,” Niemeyer said. “There are five to six males who have a pretty good life, and they rule the roost.”

Castration myth

Biologists say the claims are more myth than reality. The stories of squirrels castrating their young, they say, have been told for years.

“Biology is a funny thing and anything is possible,” said Todd Steury, associate dean for academic affairs at the College of Forestry at Auburn University. “But I’ve heard that myth before and I’ve caught a lot of squirrels. I never have seen one castrated.”

John Koprowski, a leading expert on the ecology and conservation of squirrels, said the squirrel castration myth has been told for “very long time” and has “no truth to it.”

He said it’s a common question that he often receives and is one he addressed during a podcast he did a little more than a year ago for The Meateater, an outdoor hunting TV series and website.

“Male squirrels undergo an annual cycle where their testes shrink outside of the breeding season to about 5 to 10% of breeding season size and are withdrawn – actually move through a canal – out of the scrotum and into the abdomen so that it appears they have been castrated,” said Koprowski, dean of the Haub School of Environment and Natural Resources at the University of Wyoming.

He said the testes will descend and enlarge when breeding season occurs anew. The eastern gray squirrels found at Bienville Square mate twice a year – from December to February, and from May to June.

“How many males will have descendant testes, appears (to be) related to body condition and food availability plus age to a lesser extent, but it is not uncommon to have all of the males with abdominal testes outside the breeding season,” Koprowski said. “Strange process to be sure.”

Steury said from an evolutionary standard, it makes no sense that a mother would handicap her own children through castration.

He said the entire concept of mammal castration is hard to fathom.

“Any animal could castrate some other unrelated animal to prevent competition, but even when thinking of that, my initial sense is if the animal can do that, then why not just kill the young?” he said. “And there are plenty of animals that do that. Bears, wild cats. The idea of castrating a young animal seems specific, and it’s not easy. It’s a good way to get hurt. If you fight, you won’t stick your face between another animal’s legs.”

Squirrel concerns, legacy

Despite the castration myth, the squirrel population continues to be abundant within the downtown park despite the trapping and removal of the animals.

Steury said that from a wildlife perspective, “it’s not ideal” to have squirrels being fed during human interactions. He said the activity can “cause damage to the areas where they live.”

Mobile city officials have long had that concern, and Mayor Sandy Stimpson’s administration has attempted to thwart the issue through punitive action before. In 2015, a resolution called “feed the squirrels” was tabled by the Mobile City Council after the administration pitched $500 fines for anyone caught feeding wild animals within city limits. Squirrels were listed among the animals banned in the feeding resolution.

Council members, at the time, viewed the plan as too stringent and passed on the fines.

The efforts to trap and remove squirrels in late 2021 came amid concerns from the Stimpson administration about damage cause to the oak trees that populate the park.

The bureaucratic attention paid on the feisty animals has generated a following, and the squirrels are a bit of a cultural symbol during the city’s annual Mardi Gras festivity. The Mystic Squirrels of Bienville (SOBs) were formed a few years ago and are a growing Mardi Gras organization that participates in the annual Joe Cain Day Procession. The group also serves as a fundraiser for the Mobile Arts Council.

But what to do with the squirrels is likely to loom as the city invests millions of dollars to renovate their Bienville Square home. Plans for revitalizing the park by the city, the Downtown Mobile Alliance and the Downtown Parks Conservancy began shortly after it sustained heavy damage from Hurricane Sally.

The council will vote on a contract soon with Mobile-based JPayne Organizations LLC that includes reinstalling the iconic cast-iron Ketchum Fountain removed for repairs in 2021. The contract also includes the construction of a new fountain basin, addition of a brick “seating wall,” new paving around the fountain, and LED lighting to illuminate the structure.

Niemeyer said his contract for trapping and removing the squirrels is completed, and he is unsure if his company will be asked to return to resume its work. A city official was not available for comment.

“They haven’t told us to prepare for next year,” he said.

Steury said that the squirrels, even after a large number are removed, are likely to bounce back in population.

“Squirrel populations can grow very fast,” he said. “It’s possible that they did remove a lot of squirrels. They are flexible. It’s unlikely they would get to such huge numbers that they die out and crash.”

Steury said the only way for the squirrels to leave Bienville Square is if they were no longer fed, or if the trees did not produce acorns.

That is unlikely to happen anytime soon.

“I don’t have an objection of people feeding the squirrels,” said Councilman Ben Reynolds, who raised questions about the scope of the Bienville Square project during Tuesday’s meeting, and who is inquiring about a more in-depth plan for the proposed upgrades. “There is nothing the city can do to stop from happening that I’d support.”

For Butler, that’s good news. It means more bonding time with her daughter during lazy and hot summer afternoons.

“We come out here about three times a month,” she said. “And it’s to feed the squirrels. That’s why I come here.”