CornishExile
rydhsys rag Kernow lemmyn!
From The Telegraph - note the endorsement by the apparently still credible Songbird Survival; also the entirely hilarious suggestion by the aptly named Mr Hunt, that to despatch a trapped squirrel one should lure it into a sack, then put your hands into the sack and wring its neck... Mr Hunt presumably has never tried this, or just enjoys having his thumbs gnawed by enraged rats. 
First it was magpies, now shooters are offered £500 to wipe out grey squirrels
By Daniel Foggo
(Filed: 10/04/2005)
A campaign to wipe out two and a half million grey squirrels has pledged a £500 reward to the person who kills the most.
The move, criticised by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals as being in bad taste, is the brainchild of the Ounce of Fives group.
The organisation wants to keep the bounty running until grey squirrels are extinct in Britain and blames the prolific species - brought to Britain from North America in the late 19th century - for killing the nation's trees, songbirds and native red squirrel population.
Rod Brammer, the owner of a shooting school and an organiser of Ounce of Fives (named after the load of a shotgun cartridge, known as "fives"), said that he wanted to see the grey squirrel "wiped out".
Mr Brammer, who recently caused outrage by placing a similar bounty on magpies, said: "We were going to launch this cull next year but there has been such enthusiasm for the magpie cull that we brought it forward.
"We won't stop until the only grey squirrel left in Britain is a stuffed one in a glass case."
He said that the cull would start immediately with the reward going to the person who presented the most squirrels' tails by November.
"We will then repeat the process next year until we get the job done," he said. "If we get 150,000 this year that would be a good start."
The RSPCA, however, said: "Offering a bounty to cull grey squirrels is in bad taste and increases the chances of wounding without killing.
"Culling a grey squirrel requires skill and experience. It's inadvisable for ordinary members of the public to attempt to kill them because of the risk of causing unnecessary suffering. It is much more advisable that any lethal control of greys is left to a competent professional."
Mr Brammer, however, is winning support for the campaign. He has secured financial backing from David Hunt, the director of a forestry management company based in Berkshire.
Mr Hunt said that he volunteered the funds because grey squirrels cost landowners thousands of pounds each year.
"They go for trees with thin bark, such as beech, sycamore and, to an extent, ash and oak. They bite at the bark to get the sweet cambium layer underneath," he said.
Mr Brammer said that squirrels were more devastating to songbirds, whose eggs and fledglings they eat, than magpies. "They are as bad, but there are more of them," he said.
Grey squirrels are also blamed for the decline of the red squirrel population. The smaller reds are outnumbered by 15 to one having been driven out by the greys which are better able to compete for food. Greys are also believed to pass on the virulent disease squirrel pox to the reds.
Mr Brammer said that the cull was essential because the Government had refused to tackle the issue. "Margaret Beckett [Secretary of State for the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs] and her attack poodle Ben Bradshaw [minister for nature conservation and fisheries] will not put forward anything about a species cull in case it offends their urban voters."
A spokesman for the Forestry Commission said that it would kill grey squirrels when it thought it was necessary although other methods, such as encouraging them to eat contraceptive hormones, had been tried.
He said: "We spent quite a lot of money trying to find humane ways to control them, such as giving them immuno-contraceptives to sterilise them without killing them but it did not prove to be effective."
Organisations including the European Squirrel Initiative, Songbird Survival and the Royal Forestry Society, have called for a cull of greys, and Ounce of Five campaigners are confident that they will win mass support.
Julie Spencer, the editor of the magazine Country Illustrated, said: "Getting rid of them entirely is a damn good idea. They are an alien invader and extremely damaging." Mr Hunt, whose staff regularly cull grey squirrels on the land that his company manages, offers advice to those trying to collect the bounty. "We use three methods of killing grey squirrels - shooting, trapping and poisoning. Poisoning, which is done with a warfarin-based poison, is the most effective. It builds up in the squirrels' bodies and then causes them to haemorrhage to death."
He added that, when trapping squirrels, people should despatch the rodents by luring them from the trap into a sack before wringing their necks. "They are attracted to the darkness of the sack and will run into it. Then you just reach in and break the neck."
The leader so far in the contest to kill the most magpies is a gamekeeper from Bedford who has a total of 466. The estimated running total nationally of magpies killed is about 12,000. The winner will be announced in July at the CLA Game Fair.
First it was magpies, now shooters are offered £500 to wipe out grey squirrels
By Daniel Foggo
(Filed: 10/04/2005)
A campaign to wipe out two and a half million grey squirrels has pledged a £500 reward to the person who kills the most.
The move, criticised by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals as being in bad taste, is the brainchild of the Ounce of Fives group.
The organisation wants to keep the bounty running until grey squirrels are extinct in Britain and blames the prolific species - brought to Britain from North America in the late 19th century - for killing the nation's trees, songbirds and native red squirrel population.
Rod Brammer, the owner of a shooting school and an organiser of Ounce of Fives (named after the load of a shotgun cartridge, known as "fives"), said that he wanted to see the grey squirrel "wiped out".
Mr Brammer, who recently caused outrage by placing a similar bounty on magpies, said: "We were going to launch this cull next year but there has been such enthusiasm for the magpie cull that we brought it forward.
"We won't stop until the only grey squirrel left in Britain is a stuffed one in a glass case."
He said that the cull would start immediately with the reward going to the person who presented the most squirrels' tails by November.
"We will then repeat the process next year until we get the job done," he said. "If we get 150,000 this year that would be a good start."
The RSPCA, however, said: "Offering a bounty to cull grey squirrels is in bad taste and increases the chances of wounding without killing.
"Culling a grey squirrel requires skill and experience. It's inadvisable for ordinary members of the public to attempt to kill them because of the risk of causing unnecessary suffering. It is much more advisable that any lethal control of greys is left to a competent professional."
Mr Brammer, however, is winning support for the campaign. He has secured financial backing from David Hunt, the director of a forestry management company based in Berkshire.
Mr Hunt said that he volunteered the funds because grey squirrels cost landowners thousands of pounds each year.
"They go for trees with thin bark, such as beech, sycamore and, to an extent, ash and oak. They bite at the bark to get the sweet cambium layer underneath," he said.
Mr Brammer said that squirrels were more devastating to songbirds, whose eggs and fledglings they eat, than magpies. "They are as bad, but there are more of them," he said.
Grey squirrels are also blamed for the decline of the red squirrel population. The smaller reds are outnumbered by 15 to one having been driven out by the greys which are better able to compete for food. Greys are also believed to pass on the virulent disease squirrel pox to the reds.
Mr Brammer said that the cull was essential because the Government had refused to tackle the issue. "Margaret Beckett [Secretary of State for the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs] and her attack poodle Ben Bradshaw [minister for nature conservation and fisheries] will not put forward anything about a species cull in case it offends their urban voters."
A spokesman for the Forestry Commission said that it would kill grey squirrels when it thought it was necessary although other methods, such as encouraging them to eat contraceptive hormones, had been tried.
He said: "We spent quite a lot of money trying to find humane ways to control them, such as giving them immuno-contraceptives to sterilise them without killing them but it did not prove to be effective."
Organisations including the European Squirrel Initiative, Songbird Survival and the Royal Forestry Society, have called for a cull of greys, and Ounce of Five campaigners are confident that they will win mass support.
Julie Spencer, the editor of the magazine Country Illustrated, said: "Getting rid of them entirely is a damn good idea. They are an alien invader and extremely damaging." Mr Hunt, whose staff regularly cull grey squirrels on the land that his company manages, offers advice to those trying to collect the bounty. "We use three methods of killing grey squirrels - shooting, trapping and poisoning. Poisoning, which is done with a warfarin-based poison, is the most effective. It builds up in the squirrels' bodies and then causes them to haemorrhage to death."
He added that, when trapping squirrels, people should despatch the rodents by luring them from the trap into a sack before wringing their necks. "They are attracted to the darkness of the sack and will run into it. Then you just reach in and break the neck."
The leader so far in the contest to kill the most magpies is a gamekeeper from Bedford who has a total of 466. The estimated running total nationally of magpies killed is about 12,000. The winner will be announced in July at the CLA Game Fair.
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