Squirrel control - take care

[Exeldama]

Shot 3 this week with my shotgun.... done.. No messing simple and with a little patience took about 1 hour. No suffering, safe , legal...

[Darren]

Woodlark, I put the live trap under the Kania. And they went for the live trap every time using the same bait. The only time they went for the Kania is when the live trap was not out. And that has been a one off, it's the only one Kania have killed.

There is another trap on the market which you put on a tree. It has a peanut feeder for the birds and the squirrel enters underneath trapping itself.

Kania are ok for when you are not there, but I can buy two live traps for same price as a Kania.

[RichardKing]

My Mum down at Worthing has a problem with squirrels.

Every time my brother goes down there he sets a live cage trap & gets at least one every time, sometimes several over a weekend.

[woodlander]

Darren "The only time they went for the Kania is when the live trap was not out. And that has been a one off, it's the only one Kania have killed."

I have given up useing the Kania in the vertical I put it on it's side with a timber tunnel leading into it with a peanut trail, got six this last week I usually 12 bore them but walking round I only saw the odd one .

Maybe we should start a 'most tails' competition

[Meadowcopse]

Grey squirrel stew...

https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/fcQipxbzUgE8BlKyUMTIVQ?feat=directlink

[Woodlark]

My Kania is set vertically and is catching them now. It may be that live traps are very effective, but they leave you where this thread started - how do you administer the coup-de-grace within the law? Blunt instruments are not to my liking, and I don't want anything that lawyers call a firearm, so the Kania suits our situation.

[Henrietta]

Don't you just love the peace of the woodlands, and goodwill to all fellow creatures.

This may be an inconvenient truth to you James M, but squirrels feel pain as we do. Pain is felt in order to prevent us from harming ourselves, and we wouldn't all be here if that wasn't the case, and after all, we are all animals.

I have lots of grey squirrels in my wood but I haven't seen all this damage you all describe. I do have problems with rabbits and deer and have to protect all the young plants from them. I have had problems with a woodpecker which made two big holes in my beehive in the coldest weather of the winter. I put a tarpaulin over the hive to keep out the cold and stop the woodpecker doing more damage, which did the trick. Now we have a flock of crows in the wood. They appear to be picking off the bees as they fly up. Much as this presents problems, but I would not kill any of them.

And before you ask, apart from the odd bit of roadkill occasionally, my diet is vegan.

[Darren]

Henrietta, I don't see your point? Are you saying that foreign invasive species have just as much right as say native species? Would you let Rhodos spread across your woods?

You might be lucky and not have bark stripping squirrels in your woods, but what about your neighbours? Should we work together to sort this problem out?

It's well known that squirrel bark strip and kills branches and trees and take bird eggs. You may need to look up and see if the little blighters are stripping branches.

Maybe this is a problem with so many people owning a woodland? No clear mangerment plan

[Woodlark]

Round here they have stripped branches bare on 75 year old oak trees.

[Henrietta]

Hi Darren, grey squirrels were introduced into Britain by "gentlemen", who thought they would look pretty in their country parks. They didn't ask to come here. I am absolutely against any foreign plants or animals being introduced into Britain. Peoples gardens are bursting with foreign plants, while all the native plants, called weeds are pulled up. It really isn't that simple. Apple trees aren't native, they come from Asia, but we have adopted them as our own.

Back to the squirrels. How long do you think they have been such a problem, and why are they causing such damage now? I don't know what anyone else's wood is like, but I would have thought I would see that trees were not faring well, and I do look up. We do have a lot of grey squirrels.

As for me and my woodland neighbours working together, I can't help laughing at that. One of the owners is absent, another uses his woodland as an escape, and nothing wrong with that, except that he employs contractors to do everything, which so far has been to totally fence in his woodland with tall fencing, some of that with razor wire on the top, five double sets of gates around the place, a big shed, which now has a patio. The fence, apart from keeping people out, must have cost more than the wood. The woodland itself has never been touched. I doubt the owner has even given a thought to squirrels, or anything else to do with woodland. Our third neighbours wouldn't kill animals anymore than I would.

Interestingly, red squirrels used to be killed in huge numbers, because of tree damage. Strange that they are the good guys now. I am a bit dubious when I read from someone that killing squirrels is "a good day out". Otters were hunted almost to extinction, even when I was young. Seems to me that although I have no doubt there are the problems you describe with squirrels, there are equally many people who want any excuse to kill living creatures.