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Welcome to the Northern Red Squirrels website
The site provides useful
information to support the work of Northern Red Squirrels (NRS) with this page summarising
the content to enable you to quickly find what you are
looking for.
If you want to know
more about the background and aims of NRS, these can be found on the About NRS page.
If you wish to
become involved in voluntary conservation work, our How You Can Help and Member Groups pages provide all of the
necessary details.
If you are lucky
enough to have red squirrels visit your garden and want
to know more about them and what to do to aid their
survival, visit our FAQs - Reds (Frequently Asked Questions)
page. This also includes other useful information about
breeding and habitat.
Providing food will
not only aid survival, it will encourage reds to visit
your garden. The Useful Links page includes details of those
organisations that provide food and squirrel feeders.
This page also lists and summarises the work of the
funded bodies involved in squirrel conservation in the
North.
The main threat to
the survival of red squirrels is the squirrel squirrel pox virus which it catches from the grey.
Whilst harmless to the grey, the pox is usually fatal to
the red. As the majority of grey squirrels carry the
virus, the only effective way of preventing it spreading
to the reds is to keep the two species separate. Hence,
it is important that grey squirrels are prevented from
entering areas inhabited by reds. This can only be
achieved by controlling greys that are found in red areas
through culling.
It therefore follows that if a grey squirrel is seen in
an area normally occupied by reds, it must be caught and
removed as soon as possible. The Sightings page explains how you can report
such sightings to NRS.
In order to assess if red squirrel conservation is
proving to be effective, it is necessary to continuously
monitor where they can still be found. The Sightings page also
explains how to inform NRS if you see a red squirrel.
Whilst less of a
threat than squirrel pox, family pets can also impact on
red squirrel populations, particularly in urban areas.
The Pet Threats page outlines these and what can
be done to minimise the risks.
Everyone loves to
see pictures of red squirrels. Although our own gallery
has still to be established, some of the member groups
have excellent galleries and links to them have been
included on the Gallery page.
More and more
articles are being written about red and grey squirrels.
As it is virtually impossible for anyone to find every
one, a Media Reports page has been included so that
you can access those that have been found by our members.
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Latest
News Headlines: Squirrel Fest, a day of family
fun celebrating the red squirrel will be held on Sunday
26th September at Brockhole. More details can be found by
clicking on this link.
(31 August 2010)
Cumbrian fundraiser gets
royal approval (click here for details)
(14 April 2010)
New Squirrel Ranger for
Eden Valley (see Latest News)
(9 April 2010)
Instructions for making
a Squirrel Feeder or a Nestbox added to FAQs - Reds page
(13 March 2010)
Sixth NRS Newsletter issued
(1 March 2010)
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