Red squirrels

I remember when I was a kid, I'd heard of grey squirrels but had never seen one. Our local woods was full of red squirrels. The beck that ran through the woods was home to huge numbers of water voles. Now sadly, neither species is present. There are now howeverloads of grey squirrels.

I also remember the woods were chock full of a very diverse range of wild flowers. That doesn't appear to be the case now. How things have changed in just a little more than 30 years, it's actually quite sad.

When the weather picks up a bit. I'm taking the family on a campingweekend to kielder. I've chosen it for its easy kid safe bike ride routes and the scenery, but since choosing it, ice also discovered two other advantages. It has official dark sky status so we might get a proper view of the stars and... The squirrels there are apparently of the red variety. It willbe nice to see red squirrels in the wild again. It must be about 30years since I lost saw one in thewild.

 

Never ever see a Red Squirrel but i've seen too many grey's and the damage the grey's do to our graden is shocking, i would love to get red's here but it wouldn't last long as the grey's will push it out of the way

 

The problem with grey squirrels is that they carry Squirrel pox that kills off a lot of the Reds which I think is a horrible death so it would be nice if there was no greys but that will never happen as there are millions of them

Quiet a few years ago we stayed in our caravan on the club site at Coniston in the Lake District and was fortunate the second week to have a Red Squirrel visit our pitch as I had put up poles with seed and nuts in holders so the red squirrel would sit underneath picking up and eating any nuts the Nuthatchs dropped.This little squirrel got so tame that I would sit on the closed seat in the loo gently throwing peanuts out of the half open window whilst trying to get photos of it. I wish that digital cameras had been invented in those days as it cost a small fortune having all the photos that I took printed.

It would be so nice to have more red squirrels all over the country but as have been said the greys would soon either push them out or kill them off

 

This is true; Grey Squirrels are carriers of the disease but don't actually get it. They are immune, unlike the Reds.

Greys do not "push out" the Reds or "kill them off". I do not believe there is any evidence for this. They occupy the same ecological niche. Greys are not native to Britain; they are from North America and were introduced. They out compete our native Red Squirrels. Greys are larger and eat the same foods and occupy the same/similar habitat. Because of their larger size they have the competitive edge and are more successful foragers and feeders, leaving the Reds with less to eat. They take over in other words.

 

They have pushed out our grey and black ones. Size means nothing. The greys and blacks are stupid hence their many squashed road carcasses.... The reds are not native here and have been quite invasive....funny though... they don't come on our property. ...

editing this... your red sqirrels are much more ginger than ours... hmmm. Need to educate myself a little better

but I stand by my statement. Greys and blacks are the stupidest of the lot

 

A few years ago, in Northumberland, they launched a publicity drive to convince us all that squirrels were good to eat. The idea being that if demand for them as meat was high enough to be commercially viable, they'd be shot or trapped. As the reds were protected, only the greys would be predated in this way, giving the red population a chance to recover.

Nothing seems to have become of that initiative though unfortunately.

 

Yuk. My brain cannot wrap round eating a squirrel. Thinking about worms and other disgusting discoveries.

Maybe it's best to simply bump them off and not eat them.

Over here they are nicknamed "tree rats"....

 

I'd have no problem at all with it. I can't see how it's any different to eating rabbit or pigeon or any other smaller game meat.

 

I guess I'm a bit sqeamish too. About having to butcher them. Yuk factor, big tme and not very much flesh for the effort.

 

That's what butchers are for.

 

Oh. Ours wouldn't take on that job. Curious, what would it cost to have one butchered over your way?

 

No idea. The initiative was that butchers vwould buy the squirrels from the trappers, and the public would, in blissful ignorance, but pies and such from the butchers.

 

Different breeds I think Lori . The British Isles red squirrel has been pushed into ever diminishing locations - as Woos map. Luckily we have reds on Formby Point close to Southport nearly the last location in England for them . The interesting thing on Woos distribution map is areas that have no squirrels - the green areas . Why non in Humberside ?

 

And I thought our government was sneaky... the whole squirrel eating business reminds me of the Beverly Hillbillies. Wait, they live next door to me. Maybe I should bump them off, (squirrels, not neighbours)throw them over the fence and know that they will be "recycled" Fun conversation

 

In Ireland the Red Squirrel is on the rebound in areas where the pine marten is now thriving (although the pine marten is the rarest Irish mammal). When a population of pine martens establish in an area, grey squirrels leave. Studies of this phenomenon have been undertaken but a definite reason for greys leaving hasn't been established.

It apparently is also occurring to a lesser extent in Scotland as well. It's odd that Reds can co-exist along with Pine Martens but Greys don't. Pine Martens eat both Reds and Greys occasionally.

http://www.irelandswildlife.com/squirrel-pine-marten/




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