The ‘wily weasel’ now under threat
THEY have been depicted as the wide boys of the animal world, able to escape the tightest of corners – but weasels are now considered endangered.
Campaigners are calling for the struggling species to be classed as “vulnerable to extinction” and granted legal protection.
Experts warn weasels are in sharp decline across the UK after a study found the numbers of Britain’s smallest native carnivore have halved over the past 50 years.
The Government conceded it may be forced to take action.
That could put the animal – known for its slender body, short legs and a liking for chickens – alongside bats, wild cats, dolphins, dormice, and red squirrels as a protected species.
For centuries weasels have been depicted in folklore and literature as underhand creatures. Famously they were the villains of the piece in The Wind In The Willows, ousting
Toad from his stately home. But researchers at the Mammal Society at Sussex University found weasels are now struggling from a fall in the number of mice and voles they eat.the destruction of hedgerow habitats by modern farming has also hit numbers.
Currently they have no legal protection and are often killed by gamekeepers because they prey on gamebird chicks.
Earlier this month Tory peer The Marquess of Lothian tabled a question in the Lords, asking the Government abouts its plans “to give weasels legal protection and to declare them vulnerable to extinction”.
The Minister of State for the Environment, Lord Goldsmith, replied that they could be added to the growing list of animals with legal protection.