HELP! squirrel digging up lawn

Catch them in one of those humane traps and take them for a long ride to the woods they haven't got a homing instinct like pigeons a couple of miles should be ok.

 

But then you are breaking the law.
The trouble with this idea of catching them and disposing of them ....its the same with pigeons. You might just as well p....s into the wind to be blunt about it! You dispose of one but there will always be dozens more ready to take its place. I cannot think of how you can discourage squirrels digging in the lawn, unless you have a jack russel or cat on constant guard duty. I suspect its a seasonal thing. When i walk the dog in the woods at present the grey squirrels are much more evident on the ground than before, digging away.
I am no fan of grey squirrels and see them as a confounded nuisance, being an ill advised import. However I don't agree that they attack red squirrels. They do carry a virus disease to which they seem mostly immune. Unfortunately reds are not. The virus wiped out over 90% of our native reds and this provided a spare ecological niche. This enabled the greys to expand and fill that niche, which prevents the reds from recovering and and occupying their original territories.Greys are much better suited to living in deciduous woodland than the reds,who are best suited to conifers. Unless we had a complete extinction of the greys I cannot see how we can have the reds back and that is a real shame. I do agree that those "cute" greys do take a toll of eggs and chicks.

 

Geoff, as most of southern England at least, and probably most of northern England should naturally be covered in deciduous forest, how can we say that the greys have ousted the reds.
Surely the habitat was basically wrong for the reds in the first place, apart from those small areas where they are still around.

 

The reds were occupying deciduous woodland because there was no other specie that occupied that niche. However they do have problems with it, I think food gets in short supply in june and then there are a lot of casualties. They originally moved into these Isles when the country was covered by mostly pine forest after the Ice Age but over most of Britain these got replaced by deciduous woodland that came with the warming climnate. So must reds were living in a habitat that they had not evolved in but in which they could survive.
The greys had evolved in deciduous woodland in North America and they are ideally suited to that habitat - i think they are able to exploit acorns which i don't think the reds can. So side by side the greys have the competitive advantage when it comes to exploiting deciduous woodland.
The only bit that has natural conifer forest is Northern Scotland and there is not a lot of that Caledonian forest left. It seems ironic that were it not for artificially planted conifer plantations the reds would have been wiped out completely from England.

 

Yes, I see the problem.
Its very interesting that line,
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They originally moved into these Isles when the country was covered by mostly pine forest after the Ice Age but over most of Britain these got replaced by deciduous woodland that came with the warming climnate.
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Things never stay the same, so why do we humans try to make them.

 

"The easiest way to do this if you can't bring yourself to use an airrifle is to stick the whole cage in your water butt and leave it for 10 minutes."

Has it escaped your attention that this is a living creature? Valid points have already been addressed re the grey/red imbalance so I'm not going to go into that. Bearing in mind humans can take the vast responsibility for the introduction of pests and diseases perhaps we could use the 10 minute immersion theory for them. Care to volunteer?

TO

 

We have a colony of reds not too far away from us at Formby near Liverpool, it is the remnants of ancient pineforest that covered the area aeons ago,http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/mai...-wildlife/w-nature-wildlife-red_squirrels.htm

 

I am afraid I have to disillusion you Walnut
They planted those trees to stabilize the sand dunes. The squirrels aren't native either - they brought the colony over from Russia so they are a group of red Ruskies! I think they are the same specie and you would probably have to have access to DNA to tell the difference. They survive because Formby is isolated from the rest of the country by flat farmland with no trees and hedges, so no cover for the greys to migrate down bringing the virus with them.
They are very pretty and if you go in autumn when it is quieter they will come and nibble your nuts.

Click on the photo to see more pics of the Formby squirrels

 

''Has it escaped your attention that this is a living creature? ''

*** Also vermin that do a lot of damadge both to property and to the bird population.

[ 15. October 2007, 10:19 PM: Message edited by: Pro Gard ]

 

O.M.G. To get back to the original question. If you don't want to harm it, then put up with it. They are persistant. Didn't know we had so many High Court Judges on the site :D

 

cajary,

I am always going to have my say when someone posts something that I find offensive. For every joker who mentions what they would like to do to have flat lawns or unnibbled flowers I'm aware of the morons who actually go further and inflict harm.

Pro Gard, I stand by my statement that we have to take responsibility for the introduction or at least spread of most pests and diseases. For example the French estate owner who imported the Australian rabbits in 1952. By 1953 myxie was in the UK and it has certainly affected other species who eat rabbits.

TO

 

I don't understand what you mean by that? How can i take responsibility for that??? Just because i am the same species as someone who did a stupid act does not mean I have responsility for that.
I think that as we are intelligent beings then we have a responsibility to look after our planet for ourselves and other species and treat other creatures in a humane manner. Sometimes that may mean we have to do things that we may not like To do. I don't think drowning as a method of dispatching a creature comes into that category of being humane. Shooting yes. I understand that neck dislocation is frowned upon and that is better to use a sharp blow to the back of the head.
I would hope that if I found a mortally injured rabbit then I could put it out of its misery though I would not like the experience one bit. I chickened out two weeks ago and left it to the wildlife ranger - it was a baby rabbit with myxamatosis.

 

Interesting and very emmotive issue clearly, but due to some of the more immature responses from people that like things their way or no way, I won't be touching this sort of issue again.

I respect all your opinions on the issue but feel that if people can't keep insults out of their posts, perhgaps they shouldn't be posting at all.

 

Quite right WOO. Glad I'm not in this one. :rolleyes: