British to segregate Squirrels.

international | environment | other press

Wednesday November 09, 2005 15:39

by iosaf

(human interest article)

The red squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris) is indiginous to europe its a hibernating, rodent creature that lives in trees, collects nuts, carries rabies and TB, and hibernates.
The Grey squirrel (Sciurus griseus) is indiginous to North America and was imported in the 19th century by english landowners to prettify their newly acquired scottish estates.
The Grey squirrel is pretty much the same as the Red squirrel, but its hibernation period is shorter.
thus when it wakes up hungry in january its fine little nose can hunt out the stores of nuts that its nieghbouring red squirrels have stashed. The result is famine for the red squirrels who have progressively died out since the introduction of the Grey to Britain (and thanks to the channel tunnel Europe).

But now the British want to fight back. a New £1 million scheme will set up exclusion zones around 16 of the red's last outposts in Northumberland, Cumbria, North Yorkshire and Merseyside in northern England.

"Greys that enter the three-mile exclusion zone around the core reserves, in some of the North's largest blocks of conifer forestry, face extermination by trapping or shooting."

This is all the work of "Red Alert" who are prepared to bludgeon the Greys. You can contact them and learn now to keep your area free of Grey squirrels. Because sadly some have been sited in Northern ireland.

link :-
http://telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/11/09/nsquir09.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/11/09/ixportal.html

more info on squirrels
http://www.redsquirrel.org.uk/RED_ALERT/html/aboutredalert.htm
http://www.wildlifetrust.org.uk/durham/RedAlert/

The England Squirrel Forum (ESF) has responsibility for co-ordinating the delivery of those parts of the Red Squirrel SAP that relate to England. This involves inter-related aspects of grey squirrel management and control for red squirrel conservation, but the forum also considers more general grey squirrel issues, such as environmental impacts and damage control. The ESF is made up of representatives from conservation and woodland owner and management organisations and is chaired by Forestry Commission England. The following organisations are currently represented on the England Squirrel Forum:
http://www.jncc.gov.uk/page-3214

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squirrel