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The Prince of Wales has called for help in saving our iconic tufty-eared red squirrels. The invasion of the grey squirrel means British reds are limited to certain areas across the country. The controversial new scheme involves creating ‘corridors’ of land so animals can move around more easily and trapping and killing grey squirrels.
These wily little creatures remind me of a popular advert a while ago…

Well, there’s one good thing about the snow, I’m using it to practice spotting wildlife by the criss-crosses of tracks left in our garden. It’s quite interesting to see how our foxes wander around…much closer to our house than I thought! See what’s been meandering in your garden with this handy Animal Tracks identifier.

First Britain’s native red squirrels were being overrun by the immigrant grey squirrel…but now it seems the black squirrel might be taking over. The first one was spotted in 1912 but it’s not until now that in some areas the black squirrels outnumber the greys!
These animals are the same species as the grey but are thought to have a mutation of the gene that causes pigmentation. The same black squirrels have been found in North America where our greys originate, and the chances of the mutation occuring by chance separately are tiny!