Reign of the red squirrel
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You can e-mail photographs to news@stirling observer.co.uk or pop into our office at 34 Upper towards our native red squirrels are these days extremely benign, to such an extent that in many parts of the country, war is now actively waged against the greys whilst every encouragement is aimed at reds.
Surprisingly but perhaps inevitably, there are those who disagree with such anti-grey measures for compassionate if not for pragmatic reasons and yet it is not that long ago since squirrel clubs were waging war … on reds!
Red squirrels have certainly enjoyed extremely mixed fortunes down the centuries. Their numbers were for instance, thought to have been so badly depleted by the massive felling of forests during the 18th century as the Industrial Revolution rolled in to action and by a succession of abnormally severe winters, that they were deemed, probably wrongly, to have become extinct in Scotland.
They were re-introduced with imported Scandinavian stock released by the Duke of Atholl on his Perthshire estate.
In the south incidentally, there were regular imports of squirrels from Continental Europe. Some 20,000 red squirrels were apparently sold annually in London markets. Yet, such was the alleged damage caused to forests in Scotland by the turn of the 20th century by an apparently burgeoning population of red squirrels, that the Highland Squirrel Club, established in 1903, Craigs, Stirling, FK8 2DW.
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However ironically, this slaughter coincided with the introduction to Britain of the American grey squirrel. The first of these aliens arrived in Scotland in 1896.
It may be safely assumed there was no understanding on the part of the many folk who blithely brought these aliens to this country, including incidentally some civil authorities, of the tremendously deleterious impact the grey squirrel would have and how successful their adaptation to conditions here would be.
Across Britain as a whole the impact of greys would be devastating to the reds. As already mentioned, grey squirrels harbour a squirrel pox to which they are immune but which is deadly to reds.
In addition, greys are twice the size of reds and by nature far more aggressive.
They don’t, as far as I know, kill reds but they do compete very aggressively for food sources. thus the reds are driven out of good feeding territories and eventually disappear altogether.
Hence grey squirrels in many parts of the country are I’m afraid, an omnipresence.
Modern day squirrel hunters concentrate on eliminating the greys and in Highland Scotland thankfully, the red squirrel still reigns supreme albeit that in recent decades, despite every effort to keep them at bay,
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But here is the rub! Nature itself is galloping to the rescue. A recent surge in the population of a creature, which only just escaped the threat of extinction during the “killing years” of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, has begun quite rapidly, to expand its realm.
Furthermore, this expansion has spread rapidly through Scotland and has even continued into northern England and Wales
The pine marten was once hunted unmercifully, pursued by men with packs of hounds, driven from their arboreal sanctuaries and literally torn apart.
Whilst ospreys, sea eagles, red kites and the pine marten’s close relative the polecat, were driven to extinction, the pine marten just hung on, surviving in the wilds of the far north-west of Scotland, rarely seen, one of our rarest wild creatures.
The recent strengthening of the ethos of conservation together with more positive protection laws and the growth of a more enlightened attitude towards this elusive creature has allowed it to gradually and successfully re-colonise areas where once it reigned supreme.
My own first local sighting of this new generation of pine marten came perhaps 15 or more years ago. And as their population hereabouts grew, significantly so did the population of grey squirrels begin to shrink. Funnily enough, earlier generations of the pine marten would not have even known grey squirrels. But this more recent incarnation will have discovered this “new” form of prey with great delight.
Being heavier than the nimble red squirrel, greys are consequently easier to catch and provide a better meal into the bargain!
Hereabouts, therefore, thanks to the pine marten, the grey has thankfully gone – hopefully for ever – so in perhaps the most unlikely way, nature has devised her own pest control routine and once again it is the red squirrel that reigns supreme.