Thanks a lot for your feedback and also for hosting the Game Jam, which we found very enjoyable :D. We are actually planning on polishing the project and adding new features to it, to get it to a nice state. We aim for a somewhat similar experience as "Satisfactory", where you basically try to maximize your production cycle and try to increase your efficiency. From that point of view I think it makes sense that the squirrels cost resources, so the game is more about production rates than about your current resources. (If the squirrels had just a one time cost, you could just let the game run over night and then build like a thousand villages, with the available space the only obstacle)
Also, as you mentioned, the whole plank situation is definitely confusing and the current solution is, even IF it was properly explained, probably not the best idea.