The Daily O’Collegian

A squirrel that broke its leg after falling from a tree at Theta Pond bit an 8-year-old boy Aug. 13.

The boy was sitting on a bench on the south side of the pond when the squirrel fell.

Capt. Richard Atkins, OSU Police administrative and technical services captain, said it wasn’t clear whether the squirrel fell onto the boy’s lap.

“It was probably a reaction,” Atkins said.

“After it fell, it broke a leg and when he reached down to touch it, it bit him in defense mode.”

The boy’s mother told police the boy wasn’t provoking the squirrel but she wasn’t watching the boy when the squirrel fell, Atkins said.

How the squirrel died was still unclear, Atkins said.

The boy’s mother took him to Stillwater Medical Center to be checked, according to the police report.

Atkins said a worker at the Oklahoma Animal Disease Diagnostic Lab told him brown squirrels are usually not rabid.

It is very seldom that squirrels bite people on campus, Atkins said.