Grey squirrel control to be stepped up to boost red squirrels

Mr Macmillan says;
"Morpeth Red Squirrels are presenting speculation as fact. There is no evidence to show that grey squirrels are transmitting SQPV to reds. And it's a fact that reds can pass on SQPV to other reds; a point that is deliberately kept off the agenda so that the greys can be demonised."
If it's a fact that "reds can pass on SQPV to other reds" where is the evidence? Mr Macmillan is presenting speculation dressed up as fact which is precisely what he condemns everyone else for.
By all means have a look at Mr Macmillan's website but expect hypocrisy, prejudice and a vendetta against respected conservation bodies and authorities such as the RSPB, Woodland Trust, County Wildlife Trusts, etc., etc.
Qualified scientific opinion, virtually without exception, agrees that grey squirrels currently are the most significant factor in the demise of the reds, and that this is owing to the SQPV virus carried by greys. These scientists are currently trying to ascertain the exact transmission route to assist in the fight against the virus in order to protect our native reds.
Ignore semantics about the precise meaning of the term "native species"! The accepted understanding serves scientists, conservationists and all those with no axe to grind, quite satisfactorily.
Please seek out the opinions, and the conclusions they derive from their research, of the acknowledged and highly-qualified experts on the subject such as Sainsbury, Harris, Gurnell, Hewson etc. rather than relying upon sanctimonious, holier-than thou twaddle!

Posted by: Alan Young | 15 Jan 2010 13:31:34

Morpeth Red Squirrels are presenting speculation as fact. There is no evidence to show that grey squirrels are transmitting SQPV to reds. And it's a fact that reds can pass on SQPV to other reds; a point that is deliberately kept off the agenda so that the greys can be demonised.

Currently there are a number of studies to try to find out the routes of transmission. This would not be necessary if it was already known.

Supporters of our website, some in the Northumberland area, are currently feeding grey squirrels to keep them away from traps to render the killing of these friendly and amusing little animals a waste of time and money.

For more information read the website www.grey-squirrel.org.uk
Downloads of "Victimising grey Squirrels" and "Save a life - Feed a Grey" are om the home page.

Posted by: Angus Macmillan | 24 Oct 2009 21:57:46

This disease is passed on to the red by the grey which itself is immune. Suggest reader log on to BBC Tyne web site and click on the picture gallery of reds where you will see the distressing photograph of a live red with the pox.There is no cure. It is a painful death. Thats why the vast majority of the people of Northumberland believe in the eradication of the grey.See our web site www.morpethredsquirrels.org.uk for more info

Posted by: Morpeth Red Squirrels | 24 Oct 2009 11:31:37

Congratulations on setting out a comprehensive case for accepting the grey squirrel as a natural part of our English countryside.At last a sound defence of a great little character which charms so many (as June pointed out) and is tough enough to survive the many hazards in its daily life,not least the menace of "couldnt careless motorists".I hope there are plenty of people out there utterly sick of the campaign to eradicate this guy by any nasty means possible and there have been plenty of nasty thugs willing to boast of their culling exploits.Its a common disease today to "conserve" one species or species type by slaughtering another and call it "stewardship of nature" and sadly it is organisations like English Nature and theForestry Commission who lead the way without thinking through the consequences for nature and our countryside.

Posted by: chris hill | 21 Oct 2009 18:40:28

I totally agree with this article, grey squirrels have as much right to live as red squirrels and I don't believe in bashing anything over the head, human or animal. What sort of mind would condone such an act of violence, its extreme and actually makes me cringe to think that anybody would even want to do it. Its just pure violence no matter what way you try and dress it up.
Grey squirrels are beautiful little creatures with a lovely character about them, try walking through a London Park and watch them come up to people for food, they are just trying to survive.
All animals and insects have a right to live and we have no right to take that away from them, we are not the superior race.

Posted by: June Harris | 17 Oct 2009 15:09:44

Victimising Grey Squirrels


1. Native Species?

A key criterion set by the conservation industry for determining if a species is “native” is that it should have evolved with all other species within its own ecosystem and not have been introduced or assisted by man to arrive at what is regarded as its natural location. In short, it should have got to where it is by its own efforts and evolved naturally. If man assisted it, it is regarded as “non-native”.

This is confirmed in Scottish Natural Heritage’s website:

“3.5. Native species are presumed to be those that are present in Great Britain by natural means. In general they migrated (or were transported by other species) into Great Britain after the last Ice Age, without the assistance of humans.”

“3.6. Non-native species have been introduced to Great Britain, either deliberately or accidentally, by humans.

This criterion is only credible if the actions of humans are wrongly regarded as outside of nature. As every single thing we do, without exception, is a product of our own evolution, it follows that if we transport an animal to our homeland that we find attractive, it is an entirely natural act – just as a bee might transfer pollen from one plant to another.

Also, if it is important to conservationists that a species evolves naturally over millennia in Britain to earn its “native species” status, then it should be equally important that the same species evolving in a different natural environment abroad, should not be regarded as “native” to this country. They can’t have it both ways! But they try. Different catagories of “nativeness” are applied to different species in an attempt to justify this profoundly flawed concept.

It is well known that the grey squirrel was brought from America to England in the late 19th Century but less known that ancestors of the current population of red squirrels in the UK have been largely introduced from various parts of Europe and are taxonomically different from the indigenous population. These animals evolved within a wide range of climatic and environmental conditions and associated with different flora and fauna encountered across the part of the range they inhabited, so for conservationists to argue that these influences are not important is to argue against their own concept of “native species”.

Both current populations of squirrels, red and grey, have been introduced to this country and there is no evidence that even the earlier red squirrels evolved here continuously from the time of the land bridge to Europe around 10,000 years ago. Indeed, prior to the 15th century there seems to be no record of red squirrel populations living in the UK.

Determining whether an animal is native to this country should be to regard all born in this country as “native” by birth, just as we are, irrespective of colour, background or success. To expect racial tolerance within own population but condemn and kill wildlife on the basis of its ancestral background is extremely hypocritical.


2. Habitat

If conservationists want to assist the red squirrels to survive, they should be improving their habitat by planting suitable conifer trees in which they thrive, instead of the political and identity-crisis fad of wallpapering the countryside with native broadleaves that favours the greys' expansion and the reds’ demise. The need to plant trees that favour red squirrels as a barrier to the greys’ expansion is well known to the Forestry Commission.


3. Squirrel-pox Virus (SQPV)

Conservationists tell us that grey squirrels are the "cause" of the red squirrel decline through the transmission of squirrel-pox virus (SQPV) but there is no evidence to support this. It is merely speculation presented as fact.

It is known that the disease characteristics are similar to other poxvirus infections and that most are resistant to drying. This can allow infected lesions or crusts to remain infected for a long time thus allowing the spread of the disease throughout the forest environment by almost any creature that comes into contact with it. Indeed, Scottish Natural Heritage admit they do not know the route of transmission and that "possibilities include being passed by ectoparasites, fleas, lice, ticks and mites which may transfer from animal to animal in the dreys". They also acknowledge the virus may be airborne spread. Research by McInnes et al in 2006 acknowledges "the possibility that the virus is endemic to the UK and that other rodent species inhabiting the same woodland environment could be harbouring the virus

The Forestry Commission have admitted under a Freedom of information request that “no routine testing of live red squirrels is undertaken” and they “are not aware of any scientific evidence one way or another as to whether or not there is a resistant population of reds out there”. So it is quite wrong to claim red squirrels have no immunity to the disease. Indeed, recent research by London zoologists has established that red squirrels are beginning to show signs of natural immunity.

Early in the last century, out of forty-four districts in England where red squirrels had the disease only four districts had grey squirrels present. This suggests that SQPV has been within the red squirrel population for around a century at least and that grey squirrels are victims of a campaign of unfair vilification. Some people even have the audacity to claim that SQPV somehow arrived around the time it was discovered in 1983 but that is about as ridiculous as claiming America didn’t exist before it was “discovered” by Leif Ericson – centuries before Christopher Columbus was born.


4. Immunocontraception

Immunocontraception was deemed immoral in the 1930s in mainland Europe, when it was proposed against sectors of the human population. It is equally immoral to use it against wildlife, as it could affect non-target species and introduce a significant risk of unintended consequences. Unscrupulous conservationists could also use it as a weapon of mass destruction of any species in an attempt to control nature. How long before this dangerous technology, if perfected, could be used against the human population? It is not a route that should be considered by right thinking people.


5. Culling of Grey Squirrels

Culling doesn’t work except in closed environments such as islands. According to research it would cost £200,000 per annum to control grey squirrels in Northumberland’s Redesdale Forest alone. - Rushton et al (2002) – and would require to be repeated endlessly as greys will quickly re-colonised voids, sometimes within a few weeks. Culling greys across Scotland will be an expensive and futile exercise. It is well known that culling can lead to an increase in population as those left alive enjoy a better habitat and produce more young.

“Squirrel culling is not a new phenomenon. Some 60 years ago the Ministry of Agriculture started to encourage people to kill squirrels, offering—I remember it only too clearly—a shilling a tail. I became a very wealthy young man at that time, as we had a lot of grey squirrels in the area and I did not need a lot of encouragement to do something about them. When the government at that time had paid out some £250,000, they decided that that was enough. There was no perceivable difference to the squirrel population.” Lord Plumb, March 2006

In Merseyside, a buffer zone has been in place for a number of years where grey squirrels are killed. However, increased human exploitation of red squirrels for tourism and the frequent intrusion by conservationists for monitoring population levels was always likely to lead to stress and loss of condition of the red squirrel resulting in an increased susceptibility to disease. The recent announcement that the red squirrel population has declined by 90% in the past two years is hardly surprising.

In short, fewer grey squirrels with more conservation and tourist intrusion have resulted in a massive decline in the red squirrel population – definitely not the predicted outcome.


6. Humane dispatch or brutality

Grey squirrels usually mate from December to February and again in March to May, although Forest Research has recently established that they mate all year round. Gestation takes up to 44 days and the young are usually weaned short of three months. This means that most kittens will be dependent on lactating females from mid January to mid-October. Trapping and killing these females results in the extreme cruelty of sentencing their kittens to a lingering death from starvation. There is nothing “humane” about that! It is an act of extreme cruelty.

What is “humane” anyway? “Humane” and “humane as possible” are words frequently used by conservationists to describe the killing of wildlife. So what exactly do these words mean or are they merely euphemistic references to brutality?

Red squirrel groups are currently engaged in what they call the “humane dispatch” of grey squirrels by clubbing them over the head with a blunt instrument. However, Scottish Natural Heritage’s area manager for Shetland rightly condemned the brutal killing of twenty-one grey seal pups by a local fisherman, by clubbing them over the head with a blunt instrument. He said, "This is a shocking case. The degree of casual cruelty shows that there is still a great deal of ignorance and prejudice about grey seals”. But let us not forget that SNH, together with the Scottish Wildlife Trust and others are currently engaged in the “humane dispatch” of grey squirrels by the same method, which amounts to gross hypocrisy and double standards.

Putting aside the argument of whether the animal is a “protected” grey seal or a grey squirrel, it is logical to say that if the method of dispatch is similar, there is no excuse for describing it differently. All sentient animals feel pain irrespective of whether they are “protected” or otherwise.

7. Act of violence

Clubbing a grey squirrel over the head is an act of violence and is being promoted and perpetrated nation-wide by government and red squirrel groups. Scientific evidence shows that those who have little regard for the welfare of animals are likely to have a similar attitude to their fellow human beings. Abuse breeds abuse, and in our ever-increasing violent society, what example is it to younger generations that violence and killing is an acceptable solution to a perceived problem of not being native to this country?

In reality, rather than in the arbitrary and profoundly prejudiced world of “conservation”, all squirrels born in this country are as “native” by birth as we are, irrespective of their colour, background or success. To expect tolerance within our own population but condemn these animals to death on the basis of their ancestral background is extremely hypocritical and only one step removed from racism.

It should be appreciated that squirrels, of any colour, are not “ours”. They are independent parallel mammalian populations that inhabit this planet the same as we do and should be afforded the same respect and consideration to live out their lives that we expect for ourselves.


The Grey Squirrel
Native by birth – Condemned by origin

Please read the website
www.grey-squirrel.org.uk

Posted by: Angus Macmillan | 16 Oct 2009 22:35:50