Re: introduced wildlife
- To: Tony & Moira Ryan
- Subject: Re: introduced wildlife
- From: W* B*
- Date: Wed, 8 Sep 1999 09:48:40 -0700 (PDT)
English Red Squirrels' diet consists of native nuts. They are pretty lean
in the summer until the local varieties ripen. The American Grey Squirrels
are not so restricted in their diet, eating what is available (grains
also) so that they outlast the native squirrels. I read somewhere that the
Isle of Man is a designated refuge for the Red Squirrels.
Elly Bade
On Wed, 8 Sep 1999, Tony & Moira Ryan wrote:
> Isabel Tipton wrote:
> >
> > Here on Vancouver Isalnd, Canada, we have grey squirrels which are
> > becoming a real meance. They not only take all nuts, but seem to run
> > off with plums, and in some gardens have taken up digging bulbs. Feral
> > cats are everywhere, and are making serious inroads on the songbird
> > population.The main nuisances ,however, are plants- Scotch Broom and
> > Himalayan blackberry will choke out all native vegetation if given the
> > chance, and keeping them under control is always on the mind of the
> > country gardener.
>
> Isabel
> I remember grey squirrels as bring an introduced animal in Britain
> (where DO they come from in the first place?). The main objection at the
> time (I am talking of 50 years ago) was that they were attacking and
> displacing the native red squirrel, though I have later read their food
> preferences are quite different, so I am not sure of this. I remember we
> saw them mostly in parks running over the trunks of trees and never
> heard of them being a pest in gardens. Pehaps your problem with them is
> caused by ever-diminishing supplies of wild food driving them to raid
> your gardens..
>
> We also have troubles with plants as well as possums. Broom and European
> Blackberries would be high on our list, but way short of gorse (brought
> in for hedging), which has occupied vast tracks of hillside, where early
> settlers unwisely took off the forest cover, and spreads down into the
> valley pastures where these are not well maintained. Its redeeming
> feature is the sheet of golden flowers almost all year round. The only
> other good thing about the gorse is that, if not allowed to burn, it
> forms a very good nurse crop for regenerating forest, which eventually
> overtops it and kills it by starving it of sunlight. Burning can be a
> problem, though in dry summers as it tends to go up like a torch, while
> true native growth is markedly fireproof.
>
> moira
>
> --
> Tony & Moira Ryan <theryans@xtra.co.nz>
> Wainuiomata,
> New Zealand (astride the "Ring of Fire" in the SW Pacific).
>
>
