Students can win scholarships and awards while meeting like-minded peers.<\/p>\n
“I’m so excited,” said Kira, who designed a controlled backyard experiment to study how squirrels respond to different colours.<\/p>\n
She said her family’s love of squirrels began after they immigrated to Canada in 2014.<\/p>\n
“Back in Serbia, there really aren\u2019t many squirrels … my family absolutely loves squirrels and we\u2019ve been obsessed with them.”<\/p>\n
A look at the world in squirrels’ eyes<\/p>\n
That long-standing fascination grew into a research question: How do squirrels see the world?<\/p>\n
Kira learned that squirrels, like dogs, have dichromatic vision, referring to the inability to distinguish between certain colours.<\/p>\n
Dogs can tell the difference between blue and yellow, but not between red and green, meaning they have yellow-blue dichromatic vision.<\/p>\n
“I thought, ‘Why don\u2019t squirrels have the same thing?'” Kira said. “My hypothesis was that squirrels would be more attracted to blue and yellow just like dogs.”<\/p>\n
![\"Kira](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/d433ab590f10ef52baab79d693e6cbab.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\n
Kira’s interest in squirrel vision stems from her family’s obsession with the animal. (Emma Breton\/CBC)<\/p>\n
Backyard experiment, colour by colour <\/p>\n
For her experiment, Kira transformed her backyard into a controlled testing ground.<\/p>\n
She set up five identical pots, each a different colour (red, yellow, green, blue or grey), carefully controlling for brightness using a phone-based lux meter app. Each pot was coated with a sealant to eliminate scent differences and one peanut was placed in each.<\/p>\n
To avoid bias, the pot order was randomized across trials. A GoPro camera recorded the activity as squirrels interacted with the setup over repeated one-hour sessions.<\/p>\n
![\"Kira](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/629339d419521286990fecea437a69f3.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\n
Kira’s study took two months to complete. She conducted 64 trials, but only used 50 in her study after the first 14 failed to attract any squirrels. (Emma Breton\/CBC)<\/p>\n
Across 50 valid trials, Kira analyzed the order in which squirrels approached each colour.<\/p>\n
The results surprised her.<\/p>\n
“My hypothesis was wrong. Squirrels preferred red and yellow, and least preferred grey.”<\/p>\n
She said the findings suggest squirrels may be drawn more to warmer colours rather than cooler tones like blue and green, challenging her original assumption based on dog vision studies.<\/p>\n
Kira believes her results could have practical uses.<\/p>\n
“In wildlife rehabilitation centres, red and yellow objects could be used to encourage engagement and activity, or if you want squirrels to avoid bird feeders, you could use a grey one.”<\/p>\n
After completing the study, Kira entered the project in her school’s science fair.<\/p>\n
‘She just ran with it’<\/p>\n
Alana Harrison, the library technician who runs the school’s fair, praised Kira’s efforts.<\/p>\n
“She came to me quite early on saying she was fascinated by squirrels,” said Harrison. “From there, she just ran with it.”<\/p>\n
![\"Kira](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/d7507a48d2c01d304a9fcb5c831c1a7f.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\n
A GoPro camera captured the activity as squirrels interacted with the setup during repeated one-hour sessions. (Submitted by Kira Egete)<\/p>\n
From the school’s fair, which had 70 students participants, Kira and five others were selected to advance to the Waterloo-Wellington Science and Engineering Fair. That’s where Kira secured a place at the Canada-Wide Science Fair.<\/p>\n
Kira said she was nervous going into the regional fair but quickly began to suspect she was making an impression.<\/p>\n
“There were judges coming to me, and asking questions and saying that I did a good job. That was a great feeling.”<\/p>\n
Part of her motivation for entering the competition was to see more of Canada, especially the mountains.<\/p>\n
“I\u2019ve only been in Ontario in Canada. I\u2019m excited just to experience something new.”<\/p>\n
Harrison said she’s looking forward to seeing what Kira does at the Edmonton competition.<\/p>\n
“I couldn’t be more proud. It’s just so wonderful because obviously she has a lot of passion for her project, and to see her have this level of success is just incredible.”<\/p>\n
The teen’s charitable side<\/p>\n
Beyond the science fair project, Kira is already well known in her school community.<\/p>\n
“She is an absolute gift to the school,” said Harrison. “She runs a charity called Hugs and Hand, she\u2019s on the robotics team, she runs track, she\u2019s involved in everything she can be.”<\/p>\n
![\"Kira](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/258ecef723605500f67b04ff711d81e3.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\n
Alana Harrison, the library technician who runs the Guelph school’s science fair, says she’s enjoyed seeing how Kira has developed her science savvy. (Emma Breton\/CBC)<\/p>\n
Kira said her work on the project has increased her interest in science, though she\u2019s still deciding her future path.<\/p>\n
“I do plan to pursue something in STEM, potentially engineering or maybe medicine,” she said, referring to science, technology, engineering and math. “One day, I hope to end up in entrepreneurship.”<\/p>\n
For now, she\u2019s focused on Edmonton and the squirrels that started it all.<\/p>\n
After two months of studying the animals, she remains in awe of them.<\/p>\n
“They\u2019re still adorable creatures.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Guelph, Ont., high school student who turned her family’s fascination with squirrels into an experiment is heading…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":40158,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[17,17474,10629,17473,17475],"class_list":["post-40157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-canada","tag-canada-wide-science-fair","tag-kira","tag-kira-egete","tag-science-fair"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40157"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40157\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}