I could have sworn that I’ve written about this stuff before, but I couldn’t find it in our archives. I’ve known for years that Prince Charles has a squirrel problem. I read an article several years back about British squirrels (don’t ask me why) and why there’s this huge debate within Great Britain about red squirrels versus grey squirrels. Red squirrels are the “native” British squirrel and grey squirrels are the non-native kind which came from North America. Grey squirrels = American squirrels. Ever since the grey squirrels were introduced in the UK, they’ve f–ked like squirrelly rabbits and there’s a population explosion which has threatened the poor red squirrels. Being a nature-lover and an environmentalist, Prince Charles has deep feelings about this squirrel debate. And he’s backing a solution: the grey squirrels must be sterilized and/or put on birth control.
Prince Charles has lent his support to a government-backed plan to sterilise grey squirrels and cut the population by more than 90 per cent in order to save the native red squirrel. The Prince of Wales is said to approve of a scheme that would give grey squirrels a contraceptive that lasts several years, hidden inside chocolate spread, preventing millions of births. No grey squirrels would be killed in the plans but the number of animals could reduce from 3.5 million to 300,000.
Prince Charles is said to favour the idea as a more humane alternative to culling, according to the Times. The paper reports that the contraceptive is being developed by the government’s Animal & Plant Health Agency with an initial funding of £39,000 from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. The plans were discussed at Clarence House on Monday, with members of the UK Squirrel Accord, an initiative which Prince Charles established in 2014 to control grey squirrels.
Sterilising the grey squirrel could also save millions of broadleaf trees, as the breed strips barks off trunks and branches, leading to their death when a full ring has been stripped off. According to the Squirrel Accord website: ‘The grey squirrel (Sciurus carolinensis) was introduced to the UK from North America in 1876 and its population has grown rapidly since then. The problem of grey squirrels was first recognised in 1930 when a law was passed making it illegal to release a grey squirrel into the wild. Today it is estimated that could be as many as 3 million grey squirrels in the UK and this number continues to grow.’
I’m not even joking when I say this: this is one of the reasons why I like Prince Charles and I think he’ll make a good king. He cares about the details and he’s genuinely keen on interesting stuff like this without having to tell everyone that he’s keen to be keen. I think it says a lot about him that he’s backing the most humane solution to the squirrel problem and that he even seems to be taking the lead in pushing this initiative through. Save the red squirrel! Those grey squirrels are about to go on little squirrel birth control. It’s like Obamacare for squirrels.
Photos courtesy of WENN.
God bless the Brits! American women are facing massive restrictions on their reproductive rights, but Charles is giving American squirrels birth control. I’ve always liked him.
Sobering irony.
Did you know that lions respond so well (comparatively) to captivity that most animal park lions are on hormonal contraceptives? I don’t know why I find that astounding, but I do!
I’m puzzled. Do you mean they’ve become nymphomaniacs?
Hun, no more hunting, lots of free time, the humans are our servants, let’s shag?
No, seriously! Animals that respond well to captivity are often on contraceptives in zoos and wildlife parks. Zoos have limited resources and so have to make the choice: contraceptives and not allow the animal to have the normal life cycle of mating and giving birth; allowing the natural life cycle as it’s better for the animal but then having to euthanise animals they don’t have the capacity to look after.
In fact, looking at some of the other comments about irony on this thread, I am pretty sure that US zoos incline more to contraception and European zoos to euthanasia. Longleat nearish to me got into hot water for euthanising animals not so long ago.
So yes – American zoo animals may well have better access to contraception than some American women. Pause for thought, eh? About women AND zoos.
When I lived in Oklahoma (many years ago), the quality of education was ranked near the bottom of the 50 states (as it is today — ranked 48th). The tax referendum at the time included two measures. One was to increase taxation to pay for improving public schools, and another to raise taxes to improve the zoos. You guessed it. The kids didn’t get better teachers or educational materials, but they might get a cool field trip someday.
Maybe he will put birds and fox and deer on birth control. But that means there would be fewer of them to kill for sport.
hahahah @graymatters i love you
This post will probably be rejected but I’ll see what happens:
On March 15, 2017, the Ides of March, there is a major postcard rebellion happening throughout the country. The plan is for people to send postcards to the White House to let 45 know that we’re not happy with the plans he has for the country. Google the Ides of Trump and you’ll get a ton of information. The goal is for 1,000,000 + postcards to hit the White House mail room at the same time. I’m mailing 43 cards …
Maybe CB can do a separate post on this?
I just emailed additional information to Celebitchy.
Those things are not in contradicton to each other.
He’s right, too. There are quite a few tree-planting schemes up and down the country being frustrated by grey squirrels. Just as the floods a couple of years back woke us up to the fact that we need more trees.
Red squirrels are prettier, too. We rarely see red squirrels where we are.
I’m sure there’s a U.K. versus US joke in there… Let me think…
I would give almost anything, I mean anything for a birth control I can use on the local wild cat population. A waterborne birth control system is a dream of mine. If I ever win the lottery I’m going to use the money to do the same thing. So many homeless cats.
I’m sure they’ve accounted for it, but I wonder how they’ve ensured the Red Squirrels won’t ingest the contraceptives too. It sounds like the two species are competing for the same resources already… hmm, time to go to my old dear friend Google.
In most of Britain with the exception of a few parts of Northern England and Scotland only grey squirrels are found, there are no reds left, so this wouldn’t be an issue. This is the reason there’s a problem, the two species can’t coexist and the greys displace the reds everywhere they go. I imagine they couldn’t use this method in the places where there are still reds.
TrixC… is not so much that the grey squirrel displaces the red.. the problem actually is the parapoxvirus that the greys carry and doesn’t seem to affect them but kills the red squirrels. 🙁
I was in Colchester (Essex) the other day and behind the castle there’s a park with tens of grey squirrels. They would come to you for treats and they will check your pockets to be sure you have nothing hiding in there lol!
I wish I could show you a picture I took with 2 squirrels deep down my coat pockets to find roasted peanuts!
I love squirrels but yes I agree with him. They can easily become a pest.
Here in the South, we refer to grey squirrels as varmints and they are. They get big as small cats in places and are a huge nuisance, particularly when they try to move into your home via the roofline.
When I read this, I was wishing for birth control for all the gray squirrels in my yard. My husband offered $$$ to our grandsons if they could get rid of the varmints. Yes, I live in the South. I’ve always liked Charles.
Does no one else see the irony here that in the UK even the squirrels get free birth control while in the US our government is trying to deny access to birth control for women? The religious freaks in this country are doing everything they can to kill Planned Parenthood and deny coverage for birth control to low income women. Do you think if we just started killing crops and de-foliating trees like the grey squirrel republicans would stop with their handmaiden agenda?
Red squirrels – our native variety in the UK have been wiped out in vast parts of the country by the introduction of grey squirrels. I regularly see grey squirrels in my garden on the edge of a town, but I have only ever seen one red squirrel in my life and that was 40 years ago in the LAke District. I’m all for drastically reducing the grey squirrel population.
I swear Harry talked about ginger squirrels once!
Wow I actually thought “grey squirrels ” was code for something before reading the full piece ..Ha Ha…
yes so much better than the inhumane virus that is being released against rabbits in some parts of the world. Rabbits ars the number three pet in both the UK and America I have had two and they are the best pets I’ve ever had-family. wish he couldve helped them somehow
I dont know if it was the intention, but I had a smile on while reading this article
God bless Charles
I am so glad to open up this story and find it was positively written. Charles gets far too much hate. He is genuinely someone I’d love to invite to a dinner party- wide range of interest, compassionate, and sweet.
Yay tiny condoms for Squirrels…This what I came for.
Here in Canada the grey squirrels have taken over a bit as well. Interesting fact: one fifth of grey squirrels will not forage for themselves and will only steal from others. Thanks to NG channel spies in the wild for this. I love this factoid.
If the Canadian government is so kind as to accept (who should be our) refugees, then it’s only fair to deport our illegally immigrated American squirrels back to the U.S. Please treat them humanely, and mail them to:
President Donald Trump
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500