A project launched to find out how many Red Squirrels are left has had its first success.
Carmarthenshire County Council is one of the partners in the Mid Wales Red Squirrel Project, a long with the Wildlife Trust of South and West Wales, Countryside Council for Wales, private woodland managers, Forestry Commission Wales and Powys and Ceredigion Councils. The project is funded by the Countryside Council for Wales' Species Challenge Fund. The project was set up last August to find out more about squirrels in the forests of central Wales, covering Carmarthenshire, Ceredigion and Powys, with the hope of reconfirming their presence and establishing their genetic background and relationship to other reds in Wales and beyond.
Anna Hobbs, project officer with the Mid Wales Red Squirrel Project, has recently caught and released her first four red squirrels, sexing and weighing them, and taking a sample of hair, which was sent to Bangor University for DNA analysis. The squirrels were then released back into the forest.
Carmarthenshire County Council diversity officer Isabel Macho said:
"Numbers of red squirrels are in serious decline. In Wales there are just a few sites where red squirrels live - Anglesey, Denbighshire and our little known population in central Wales.
"They have been replaced by the alien grey squirrel, which can out-compete red squirrels and who also pass on a virus that kills the reds."
"Trapping these squirrels is hugely significant after eight months of no success."
The project is seen as the last chance to save this population of red squirrel. Appropriate future management of the forest habitat is critical for their survival.
Posters explaining the plight of the reds have been put up in survey areas to raise awareness of the project and to ask people to let the Wildlife Trust (telephone: 01239 621600) know if they see any squirrels.
Save Our Squirrels!
