The Institute’s research is organized around a small number of long-running questions in the conservation biology of urban and peri-urban squirrel populations. Work is carried out in partnership with regional zoos, university field stations, and independent researchers across the New York metropolitan area.
The 1910 Flying Squirrel Extinction
The New York population of the North American flying squirrel (Glaucomys sabrinus) is recorded as having gone locally extinct in 1910. The Institute’s central research program is dedicated to reconstructing the ecological, climatic, and land-use conditions that preceded that loss — and to identifying the present-day analogues of those conditions in surviving regional populations.
The intent is practical. By understanding what was lost, and how, we can recognize early warning signs in the species that remain, and intervene before another local squirrel species follows the same trajectory in the twenty-first century.
Comparative Work
Our work draws on a comparative tradition that includes prior research on the Pakistani woolly flying squirrel (Eupetaurus cinereus), conducted at the Staten Island Zoo. That species’s rediscovery and continued vulnerability offer instructive parallels for thinking about the flying squirrels of the American Northeast.
Managed Breeding
Breeding work at the Institute is led by staff scientists and focuses on facilitating reproduction across a range of squirrel species in our care. Programs are designed to preserve genetic diversity, support reintroduction studies, and contribute long-term reference data to the broader conservation literature.
Affiliated Programs
The Institute maintains research and care relationships with organizations across the region, including the Staten Island Zoo, and welcomes inquiries from academic collaborators and graduate researchers.