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Red Squirrels
12.57 pm
Mr. Peter Atkinson (Hexham): It is a pleasure from time to time to enter the Chamber to participate in a debate that is not acrimonious. Sometimes the House is at its best when there is general agreement, and the protection of a part of our valuable wildlife--the red squirrel--is a subject dear to many hon. Members' hearts.
I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Gateshead, East (Ms Quin) for her early-day motion calling for greater protection for the red squirrel, which has received widespread support from hon. Members of all parties.I welcome my right hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Mr. Atkins). We share many common interests, including one-eyed lorry drivers.
The red squirrel faces a serious plight. As recently as the 1920s, the red squirrel was commonplace throughout most of the British isles. One could see it even in suburban gardens. It was ubiquitous throughout the nation. Today, the red squirrel has retreated to a few outposts. It is found on the Isle of Wight and Brownsea island, and in a few places in Wales. There are about50 red squirrels in Thetford forest, and a few can be found on the Lancashire coast, in north Lancashire and in Durham. However, the red squirrel's last refuge is really Northumberland and Cumbria, where the species is still found in numbers.
The reason is that there are no grey squirrels in those areas. The problem that the red squirrel faces is competition from the grey. The grey squirrel was introduced to this country in the 19th century as an ornament in parkland. It comes from north America and is much more robust than our native red. The consequence is that the grey squirrel beats our native species to the best habitats and to the available food, so the red squirrel disappears from areas invaded by the grey.
I know that you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, have a different species in your area--a black squirrel imported from south America by the Dukes of Bedford many years ago. They have now escaped into the surrounding countryside, and although they are attractive, they will only add to the problems faced by our native red.
I pay tribute to the organisation known as Red Alert. The group is chaired by Viscount Ridley and is made up of a number of wildlife organisations and forestry interests: the Northumberland Wildlife Trust, the Timber Growers Association, the Forestry Commission, English Nature and others concerned about the steady decline of the red squirrel. They banded together some time ago and raised the profile of the campaign to safeguard the future of the red. Without that campaign, the red squirrel would have continued to disappear from the last few places where it is found, and some time during the next century, this once popular and much loved specimen of our wildlife might have disappeared altogether.
Red Alert's greatest achievement has been to publicise the issue and bring it to the attention of the public. It has also won a great deal of support from farmers, foresters and landowners in the north. One tactic that Red Alert is working on is the drawing of lines around the areas where red squirrels live. The idea is to repel the grey squirrel from further advances to the south and the north. There are now grey squirrels in the Scottish border country;
the danger is that they will move over the border into Northumberland. The people who own and cultivate the land there have become interested in a system of culling grey squirrels before they can spread further.
Whereas most of Northumberland used to be free of greys, in recent months there have been reports of greys in the southern part of my constituency. Red Alert has engaged in further practical projects, including studying data on red squirrels, drawing up a map of their distribution, and training people involved in forestry in the control of greys and in creating habitats more suitable for reds.
A two-pronged operation is called for: the control of the grey squirrel and the encouragement of the red. The red does better in certain habitats; the grey is dominant in broadleaf woodlands, but the red survives well in conifer plantations. In the Kielder forest in Northumberland, which is part of the forest of Spadeadam, Forest Enterprise is creating a reserve for red squirrels by carefully felling and planting trees of specially selected species.
For instance, the red does not like the ubiquitous Sitka spruce, but it likes the Norway spruce. So in the reserve, Norway spruce will become the dominant tree. It is also important that those planting the new community forests design them with our native red squirrel in mind.
Control is the other side of the coin. It is difficult to discuss the subject because squirrels are seen as furry animals, liked and fed by members of the public in the royal parks. The latter do not understand sometimes that restoring the red squirrel involves controlling the greys. Extermination of the species will never happen, but control is called for.
The only really satisfactory method is the use of warfarin, a rat poison. It has been used for a long time by forestry interests, because the grey squirrel is a serious pest for forestry. Ten or 15-year-old hardwood trees that have survived the early stages of development when they are most at risk and which are just about to prosper and become full-grown trees are the ones attacked by the squirrels, which peel their bark off. Sometimes that kills the trees; sometimes they are merely stunted.
The difficulty is that the pesticide regulations rightly forbid the use of warfarin in areas where there are red squirrels. We do not want to kill reds at the same time as greys. The Forestry Commission and others, including the Countryside Council for Wales, have developed a method of feeding the poison to grey squirrels but not to reds. This is done with a specially designed hopper. The red cannot get into the feeder because it is much weaker than the grey and cannot lift the lid.
If these experiments are successful, we want the Minister to help us by redrafting the pesticide regulations--the warfarin order--so that these special traps may be brought under the control of local wildlife authorities, and we can begin to control grey squirrels in areas where they are advancing on the territory of the reds.
There is not much point in a campaign to control greys in areas where there are no reds left. It is in the border areas where both exist that control is vital.
Mr. Elliot Morley (Glanford and Scunthorpe):
The hon. Gentleman is making an excellent case, and has
Mr. Atkinson:
I agree entirely. At present, warfarin is the only practical method we have. Shooting is not effective. Live trapping is possible, and if a red is accidentally trapped it can be released; but that puts a certain stress on red squirrels, and it is time-consuming and labour-intensive. Moreover, if the traps are not regularly inspected, the victims may be caused considerable suffering.
Contraceptive bait is being investigated at the moment. Sheffield university, funded by the Forestry Commission, is involved in the research. The effect is to sterilise male grey squirrels. That may come as a surprise to them,but it will be a humane way of reducing their numbers.
There is also an experiment under way in Anglesey, where there are 50 reds left and 1,000 greys. The Countryside Council for Wales is providing feed hoppers to find out whether the experiment will work. If it satisfies those who supervise our pesticide regulations, the rules must be changed to allow the system to be deployed in the border territories.
The hon. Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe(Mr. Morley) is correct to emphasise the importance of habitat creation suitable for red squirrels. We might use the new woodland improvement grants for this purpose. The Forestry Commission gives out such grants for several projects, and it would be useful if this project could be considered for a grant. Thus, the costs of grey squirrel control, and of habitat creation for red squirrels, could be borne by woodland improvement grants.
Scientific advances in contraceptive bait will probably offer the long-term solution to the problem of the grey squirrel. If so, it will become possible to consider the reintroduction of the red squirrel to areas from which it has vanished--to the royal parks, for instance. They were once common there, but London children who visit the parks think that all our squirrels are grey. That is very sad. As the hon. Gentleman said, quite rightly, in addition to reducing the number of grey squirrels, one has to supplement the feed of red squirrels for them to prosper.
Mr. Robert Atkins (South Ribble):
I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) for allowing me a moment or two in the debate, and we are all keen to hear what my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary has to say.
When I was doing the job that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary is now doing, I paid a visit to Mere Sands wood, which is adjacent to my present constituency of South Ribble and will form part of my new
constituency. The wood is controlled by the Lancashire Wildlife Trust, and it contains a small number of red squirrels, largely because of the island habitat to which the hon. Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe(Mr. Morley) referred. The grey squirrels cannot jump across to the island to cause problems.
When I was a small boy, I used to walk to school through Highgate woods--a very ancient woodland area--in London, and I saw red squirrels there. A small amount of money was offered at one stage to people who killed grey squirrels, which were even then damaging the red squirrels' habitat. I believe that there are now no red squirrels in London or the south-eastern area. My part of world is the first place on the way north in which you would bump into red squirrels, Mr. Deputy Speaker,as opposed to black ones.
I urge my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary to pay great attention to the problem. The red squirrel is a very important part of the indigenous mammal life of this country. I am delighted that Viscount Ridley and the Red Alert campaign are trying to save the red squirrels. I hope that we can generate more red squirrels in the future, because they are important for our native habitats. I will do all I can to ensure a future for the red squirrels in Mere Sands wood and other areas.
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