IT'S A brush with death that has provoked both howls of approval and protest. Grey squirrels are being literally thrown to the wolves at a Scottish wildlife centre.
Camperdown Park in Dundee has stepped up its cull of the aggressive rodents in a bid to secure the future of their red cousins. To enhance the scheme's eco-friendly credentials dozens of the dead creatures are being "recycled" by being fed to the wol
ves and eagles in adjacent animal enclosures.
Park bosses claim the policy is a common sense way of making the best of a nationwide offensive against grey squirrels.
But the move has left a nasty taste in the mouths of some animal rights activists who insist the cull is unnecessary. A spokeswoman for Dundee City Council confirmed that scores of greys eventually end up being served up as food after being exterminated in the park.
She said: "We have a control programme for grey squirrels and employ a gamekeeper who culls approximately 150 a year.
"Samples are taken from the dead squirrels and sent to a laboratory to establish whether or not they are carrying the parapoxvirus which is fatal to red squirrels. The bodies are then sent back to Camperdown Wildlife Centre where they are fed to some of the animals such as the wolves and eagles."
The authority said it was a non-wasteful way of complying with a necessary policy: "We recognise the need to cull the grey squirrel population in the hope of increasing the red squirrels' chances of survival."
But Ross Minett of the campaign group Advocates for Animals claimed the policy was misguided. He said: "Let's not pretend that this killing of grey squirrels is justified as providing a food source for other animals, especially those that in their natural environment are predators that are unlikely to hunt squirrels in the first place.
"Perhaps the council can justify this slaughter of squirrels, and the huge price tag that goes with it, by saving some cash on feeding other animals. That is no justification for it and we are against a cull."
The park, which is one of the city's most popular visitor attractions, has a wildlife centre which boasts more than 50 species of animals, including brown bears, lynx and pine martins.
Ken Neil, of the Saving Scotland's Red Squirrels project, said the cull was having a positive effect.
He said: "There has been an enormous effort put in to reduce the substantial grey population. The good news is that we now have a steady population of about 100 red squirrels in the city. We are also seeing signs of red squirrels returning and settling down in one area."
Neil said the extermination programme was carried out humanely and out of sight of the public.
"The city gamekeeper has played a huge part in helping us to hang on to our red squirrel population. He works in the public areas of the park very discreetly in the early hours before anybody is up and around.
"They are dispatched humanely according to the rules which have been widely agreed. The whole system works smoothly and there is a general public awareness that it is necessary."
Earlier this year a mass cull of grey squirrels was announced as part of £1.3m Scottish Government funded scheme to protect their indigenous cousins. Red squirrels were once common throughout the UK, but their population has declined to just 120,000 – most of which is concentrated in Scotland.
Grey squirrels were imported from America in the late 19th century as fashionable adornments for the gardens of the wealthy, but they quickly spread and began to outnumber the russet mammals.
The full article contains 617 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
