Can a squirrel alarm environmentalists? Yes, if it is a specimen spotted for the first time in an “almost impossible place”.
Can the presence of a squirrel alarm environmentalists across an entire nation? Yes, when it comes to one gray squirrel spotted in the UK in a place that, according to the volunteers of the Saving Scotland’s Red Squirrels project, is “almost impossible”. Or at least that’s what they believed.
Gray squirrel spotted on Seil Island
Seil Island is not exactly the habitat of the gray squirrel. We are located at Oban in the county of Argyll in Scotland, where we still wonder how it was possible for the gray squirrel to arrive when the latest closest sightings – so to speak – are at least 161 km away from this place. A “almost impossible place”said members of the Saving Scotland’s Red Squirrels project, who are deeply concerned about the protection of Scotland’s native species, the red squirrel.
The gray squirrel is native to North America and has been classified as an invasive species in the United Kingdom, precisely because it represents a serious threat to the survival of the native red squirrel. Seil Island is connected to the mainland by a short crossing nicknamed the Atlantic Bridge, but gray squirrels have never been spotted there before.
First brought to the UK by the Victorians as an “ornamental species” to be displayed in the gardens of stately homes, these animals they caused a lot of damage to the local fauna, starting to compete with red squirrels for food and habitat. Furthermore, some specimens also carry a lethal virus for the native species (smallpox). It is no coincidence that in 1930 their release into the wild was prohibited but by then the damage had been done: gray squirrels spread first to England and Wales, then to part of Scotland.
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The red squirrel is increasingly at risk
Katie Berry by Saving Scotland’s Red Squirrels explained that the gray squirrel was in an area previously known to be solely red squirrel habitat: “Seil is a very unusual place, in fact it’s an almost impossible place for a gray squirrel. We can’t say for sure how it got there. It could potentially have arrived via some type of transport.”
Saving Scotland’s Red Squirrels has launched an appeal for any further sightings in Seil, around Oban and surrounding areas, in the hope that this is an isolated case. The partnership project aims to ensure that red squirrels continue to be part of Scotland’s special native wildlife. Currently, 75% of the specimens of this species remaining in the United Kingdom live in Scotland but their number has decreased dramatically in the last decades.
An alarming fact that depends precisely on the spread of the American gray squirrel. Among other things, the first documented death of a red squirrel due to the virus is recent smallpox north of the central Scottish belt. After a thorough veterinary examination, experts from the Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies at the University of Edinburgh found that ulcers and crusts around the eyes and mouth were attributable to the contagion of the virus. News that could have serious consequences for the red squirrel populations in the area.
