In Europe, red squirrel populations have declined due to factors such as habitat loss, disease, and competing with Grey squirrels for food. Recent footage revealed that the red squirrel seems to have another competitor for their food—the woodpecker.



Karen Crawford, a resident of Scotland, routinely goes to woodland near Lockerbie, where she places nuts a tree for red squirrels. Some other residents would leave nuts in their gardens and peacefully allow the squirrels to claim the food.

One day, Karen witnessed a woodpecker and a squirrel arguing over food. The woodpecker was protecting the nuts it found while the squirrel was defending its regular source of food. Eventually, the squirrel gave up after realizing its disadvantage.

Karen shared that the red squirrels typically wait for her to put out nuts for them. That particular day, the woodpecker must have arrived before them and immediately protected its territory.


"The woodpecker was on one side of the stump feeding on the nuts, and as soon as it saw the squirrel, it became aggressive towards it," she said. At first, the squirrel fought back but eventually knew that it would not win the fight.

Karen also only realized that she captured the animal argument when she checked her camera afterward since she usually takes photos of the landscape. In the photo, she was amazed that the animals really looked like they would have fought. The red squirrel had a paw raised in the air while the bird was shouting with its beak wide open.


The Grey Squirrel

However, the red squirrel's greater concern is the grey squirrel, an invasive species that was introduced from North America in the 1870s. The greys are larger in size, monopolize food resources without sharing with the reds, and compete for habitat and breeding sites.

The larger species also carry the squirrelpox virus, which is fatal to red squirrels and seem to be a significant factor in the decline of their population. According to Wildlife Online, the disease causes red squirrel populations to decline 25 times faster than natural causes.

Between 1996 and 1998, Luc Wauters and John Gurnell observed reds and greys in Italian woodland areas in Lombardy and Piedmont. At the time, it seemed that the two species peacefully co-existed and had different sources of food.

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The Decline of Red Squirrel Populations

In the 1880s, the red squirrels were hunted down due to the timber industry, especially in Scotland. James Richie, the author of 'The Influence of Man on Animal Life in Scotland,' wrote that between 1902 and 1917, nearly 60,450 squirrels had been killed. The natural habitat of the red squirrels was also cleared and converted into farmland or sheep pasture by early farmers.



Today in the UK, red squirrels are a 'near threatened' species where there are only about 120,000 to 160,000 left. Other populations of reds are found in other parts of Europe and in Asia.

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