Red squirells in London

curioustoo · #1 (**permalink**) 18-11-2007, 05:10 PM

Someone was talking the other day about watching red squirrels in north London in the 60s or 70s. Does anyone know if there were still reds about then or would they have been rufus greys?

aeshna5 · #2 (**permalink**) 18-11-2007, 05:44 PM

I believe there were Red Squirrels hanging on around Epping Forest until the late 50's + this was supposed to be the last stronghold in the London area. There was a re-introduction scheme based around Regent's Park around the time period you mentioned, but this attempt failed- I know some were killed by cars.

tufftie · #3 (**permalink**) 19-11-2007, 08:16 AM

I was sitting on the Heath a year or two ago and overheard two official types talking about releasing red squirrels in the Kenwood area. I felt a bit guilty about eves dropping so I did the clearing throat thing and unfortunately didn't get to find anything else about it - they weren't overly friendly. I've tried to find out more about it since but to no avail. Even if you discount grey squirrels i can't see that there would be enough of the right tree species to provide a sufficient food source for a colony of red squirrels there. So as far as I know - no squirrels in London at the moment and purely from a food/habitat point of view there wouldn't be any suitable places to release them at the moment, unless they did some serious replanting in an area like the Heath or Richmond park.

curioustoo · #4 (**permalink**) 19-11-2007, 09:25 PM

Thanks to Aeshna5 and Tufftie for your replies. The area in question was Finchley and, no, I'm pretty sure there weren't any conifers around. I guess these were greys.

tufftie · #5 (**permalink**) 20-11-2007, 06:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by curioustoo

Thanks to Aeshna5 and Tufftie for your replies. The area in question was Finchley and, no, I'm pretty sure there weren't any conifers around. I guess these were greys.

I'll have a look in Monica Shorten later as she has stats for squirrels in London - only they only go up to 1954.

tufftie · #6 (**permalink**) 22-11-2007, 09:01 AM

Ah, not in MS must have been somewhere else sorry! The stats she does have for reds in London show that there were no reds there in 1945, one red on Streatham Common in 1932 and Abbey Woods and Bostall Woods both had red squirrels in 1925. Sorry if I come across the other info I'll post it on to you!