Grey squirrel cull ranger branded ‘racist’
CONSERVATIONISTS who cull grey squirrels to protect reds have revealed they are often accused of being ‘racist’ and ‘xenophobic’.
Andrew Hodgkinson, a member of Cumbrian charity Penrith and District Red Squirrel Group said: ‘We get called racist because we shoot the greys because they’re grey, not red.
‘So it’s like we’re shooting them because of the colour of their fur, which it really isn’t. It’s crazy. We also get called xenophobic, because we are promoting a native species, so it’s all about British stuff.’
Mr Hodgkinson, a red squirrel ranger, added that he would love it if he no longer had to kill squirrels. He told the BBC: ‘I look forward to the day when I don’t have a job, when I don’t have to shoot any grey squirrels because they’re all gone and the reds are OK.’
Grey squirrels are classed as vermin in the UK. Native to America’s eastern seaboard, they were introduced to country estates in Britain in the 1870s as something of a fad.
The greys now number around 3.5million in the UK compared with 1 0,000 red squirrels, most of them in Scotland. The greys are larger and can store up to four times more fat to get them through a harsh winter. They also produce more young, live at higher densities and carry squirrelpox, which is deadly to reds.
Red squirrel supporter Julie Bailey, also based in Cumbria, said that she and her husband fell in love with them when they came tapping for food at their window.
But after a grey appeared, the reds all quickly succumbed to the pox.
She joined the local red squirrel group and hunts greys, which can legally be killed if it is done humanely. She keeps the meat – used in burgers and curries – in her freezer.