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A squirrel king is a bunch of squirrels whose tails have tangled together, making them unable to self-separate.[1] It is similar to a phenomenon recorded in rats, the rat king, of rats with tails tangled together.[2] The squirrels that become tangled are nest-mates (ie. siblings), whose tails become knotted together. It may occur with the assistance of the nesting materials, also becoming part of the knot, as a sort of binder. Or, tree sap may glue the tangled tails together. If the squirrels are not separated, they will invariably die, making this a lethal condition.[3][4] Unlike the rat king, the squirrel king is not found in medieval European literature.[5]
Babies were successfully separated, however, part of 1 tail needed to be amputated.[19]
Unnatural incidents
There have been incidents of animal cruelty or taxidermic artwork, where humans tied the tails of squirrels together, making something resembling the natural squirrel king.
On 19 September 2019, 4 squirrels were found knotted together and tied up, on railroad tracks in Berlin, Connecticut, USA. They survived to be separated, but needed some amputation. In order to tie them up, the person who performed the incident had to break their tails.[20][21]