Red squirrels make a comeback after 20,000 Grey Squirrel cull!

[Dick Glasgow]

I must say, when you see it all written out like that, it strikes me as being pretty Draconian & Barbaric.

Shooting certainly isn't going to guarantee a clean kill every time.

As for Traps, the golden rule applied to their applications seems to be that they must be checked Morning & Evening. That could easily leave a fit, healthy & energetic Squirrel cooped up in that tiny space for many hours, which hardly strikes me as being very humane really.

Of course, then you are back to how to despatch the Squirrel, once you have caught it .....

With Traps like the Fenn, you are always at the mercy of the skill, or otherwise, of those setting them & the danger to non target species blundering into a badly set trap.

I would certainly agree with you that any form of Poison could never ever be considered humane.

What a pity we couldn't just ship them all back home!

Cheers
Dick

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by Dick Glasgow

I must say, when you see it all written out like that, it strikes me as being pretty Draconian & Barbaric.

Shooting certainly isn't going to guarantee a clean kill every time.

As for Traps, the golden rule applied to their applications seems to be that they must be checked Morning & Evening. That could easily leave a fit, healthy & energetic Squirrel cooped up in that tiny space for many hours, which hardly strikes me as being very humane really.

Of course, then you are back to how to despatch the Squirrel, once you have caught it .....

With Traps like the Fenn, you are always at the mercy of the skill, or otherwise, of those setting them & the danger to non target species blundering into a badly set trap.

I would certainly agree with you that any form of Poison could never ever be considered humane.

What a pity we couldn't just ship them all back home!

Cheers
Dick

As i said higher up i think the key is to have proffesionals doing the culling - back in the days that i was doing it, using a FAC rated airgun and .25 pest control pellets we found that virtually every shot killed clean (except those that missed completely), but we also used to use a lurcher on the ground to make sure than any squirel knocked out of a tree wounded rather than cleanly killed was caught and quickly despatched - as far as i can recall we never had a wounded animal escape. - the real key being not to shoot unless one was sure.

cage trapping wise checking morning and night is fairly pointless when you are dealing with a diurnal species like squirel - we used to only use cage traps in the area in which we were shooting, the idea being that they were their to catch any squirels fleeing from the disturbance - and we used to deactivate them when we had finished for the day (ie we would leave them in place with the doors locked open) - despatch was by a clean shot to the head while still in the cage - both to avoid stressing the squirel by handling it and to avoid injury to ourselves from squirel bites.

We didnt use fenns in that particular operation, but i have used them for rodent and mustelidae control on a different project, and the key is to have them in tunnels that non target species can access, and to have them securely anchored so if an animal were to be trapped bu not killed it cant drag the trap away (though i never found that to be the case - everything that we trapped was killed instantly)

I've not used poison both because i consider it inhumane and also because of ecosystem/foodchain effects but wafarin hoppers are widely used for squirel control (e.g by the forestry commision) where they can cover a large area cheaply - hoppers are weight controlled so non targets like red squirels and dormice cant acces them.

I agree that none of this is very nice and I did find carrying out control to be somewhat distressing, but my take on it is that if the red is to be protected (or for that matter woodlands managed for wildlife) grey control is an unpleasant necessity, and I would rather do it myself , however upsetting, than risk leaving it in the hands of someone who cared less about ensuring they kill clean

There are moves afoot to develop an oral contraceptive for the grey, which could be delivered via hopper - that would render lethal control unnecessary, but its a way from fruition yet, and alsop we would need to be sure that it was not going to have unforseen ecosystem effects before it was widely deployed

[Dick Glasgow]

Here's an interesting aside!

Did you know that the 'Highland Squirrel Club' exterminated 100,000 Red Squirrels!

"BY THE end of the 18th century, the red squirrel was virtually extinct in Scotland as a result of woodland clearance and severe winters caused by global cooling."

"In 1844, Lady Lovat of Beaufort Castle, near Beauly, re-established the red squirrel into the Highlands.
The reds soon multiplied exponentially.
Angered at the damage done by the newcomers, a Highland Squirrel Club was set up.
Its mission was to eradicate the unpopular rodents.
The club exterminated 100,000 Red Squirrels and paid locals who brought in squirrel tails.

This curious piece of history is worth remembering in the light of a new plan to wipe out every grey squirrel in the north of Scotland, in an attempt to protect the "native" red squirrel from being supplanted. The campaign will cost £1.3 million and is being organised by Scottish Natural Heritage and the Scottish Wildlife Trust.

If the Highland Squirrel Club could not get rid of the red squirrel, modern quangos are unlikely to get rid of the greys, except temporarily.

The squirrel is one of the oldest mammals in existence – a testimony to its evolutionary tenacity.
It has been around for 50 million years – 100 times longer than Homo sapiens.
When we are all dead, there will still be squirrels."

Squirrels: nature's great survivors!

Makes you wonder if it is really worth all the effort, doesn't it!

Sometimes I get the feeling we're just running around in circles, chasing our own tails! ..... a bit like Squirrels really!

Cheers
Dick

[STYRBJORN]

Originally Posted by slimrbp

I usually don;t participate in this sort of thread as I have often have trouble articulating myself in text without rambling, but here goes...

My initial emotional reaction is to be against any mass cull, then more rational side kicks in. I think this is because being based down South I am used to Greys and enjoy their antics so it is difficult to imagine someone going around the local parks and culling the squirrels.

However in areas where Red's already exist I can absolutely see that is a good idea to try and protect our native species and if the unfortunate necessity is that the Grey has to be prevented from gaining a toehold then I can't see what else we can do in the short term. And in the same vein I can see the point of trying to expand these pockets by pushing back the borders. For example the Isle of Wight has the same no tolerance policy towards the Grey and I have no porblem with it.

Doesn't this sort of thing go on all the time? I seem to remember the Kakapo was only saved from extinction because they now live on an island that had it's cat and rat population culled, and weren't a number of our Seabird colonies rescued by the culling of introduced ground predators?I see the point that Man's activities have also had a negative influence but doesn't that just make the area where the Reds thrive even more precious?

Hedgehogs

Ric

[Gatekeeper]

Defra seem to be making short work of eradicating the Ruddy Duck on a national scale, so the efficiency of modern organisations should not be underestimated.

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by STYRBJORN

Hedgehogs

Ric

and black rats

[STYRBJORN]

Originally Posted by eeyore

and black rats

Many years ago - well, 40 odd - I was running a small manufacturing business,housed in an old building. We had our inevitable brown rats, mice, creepy-crawlies in general. We also had a resident black rat and he/she was BEAUTIFUL! About 15" from nose to base of tail plus 12" of tail, always clean, jet black in colour. Et the mouses, chased off the brown cousins, and generally acted as janitor if we left him/her to it. A couple of my people trapped it one day, as they thought. I had to rescue them after the rat backed them into a corner. After that I made clear that the rat was a member of staff and should be treated as such. Never did manage to teach it to clock in though.

Ric