Red squirrels

[Hedera]

Lovely pictures. Brought back childhood memories. Feel sad children today may never see a red squirrel.

[naturegirl]

Me too, such lovely creatures!

I hope my grand children will be able to see, know and have a love of these beautiful animals.

I too, knew them in my youth for the charismatic creatues that they are and can only hope that future generations will also be able to enjoy them.

Naturegirl

[Ladywell]

I think I am correct in saying that the have got rid of all the greys from Anglesey to try to encourage the reds - of which I think there are at least two different sites for them - and growing - !!

[Billabong Karen]

Did anyone see Countryfile last night? There was a section on red squirrels, documenting the losing battle on supporting these lovely creatures. They were saying that they expect them to be extinct in the UK in the next 20 years. So sad

Also very worrying for the European continent. The greys are bigger and outcompete the smaller greys, and carry a disease that the reds are not resistant to. If the greys manage to get a foothold in mainland Europe, does that mean that the red squirrels there are also in danger?

[diggleken]

I'm sure it would Karen.
As an aside, whats a good attractant for them, I'm going to a cottage with reds in the garden, cant wait to take some closeups, so peanuts maybe just as for Greys?
Cheers
Ken

[Billabong Karen]

In my garden in the hills outside Frankfurt I used to observe them stripping pine cones to get at the seeds. They also seemed very partial to any sort of nuts, and I always put nuts (hazelnuts, chestnuts - anthing I had really!) out for them on sunny days in the winter.

Interestingly, we used to get different coloured squirrels in the garden; both reddish ones and much darker brown ones.

[galanthophile]

Nice feature on Countryfile and it also featured those 5 rescued red squirrel kittens and how they are faring being hand reared by a lady in her house, they were adorable. They are being helped through the winter and released hopefully in the spring. Long may they continue to inhabit our countryside.