Wildwood’s young red squirrels are preparing for the longest and most exciting journey of their lives. Five of the captive bred young are being transported to the North Welsh Island over the next few days.

After a period of acclimatisation the young will be allowed a true taste of freedom and be fending for themselves in the wilds of the Anglesey countryside.

Wildwood is part of a scheme to protect the red squirrel population in the UK, this once common British native is now under very real threat from the invasion of the introduced American grey squirrel. Wildwood breeds the red squirrels in specially created natural enclosures and then after a period of time learning skills from there mother they are transported to Wales where they are released in to a grey squirrel free environment.

“It is great to know that these five youngsters will helping to protect the red squirrel in the UK” says Paul Wirdnam Head Keeper at Wildwood “and that they will be living wild very shortly”

The Wildwood youngsters ensure that the population in Wales is kept as healthy as possible reducing the chance of in breeding.

The the project leader, Dr Craig Shuttleworth , of the Anglesey Red Squirrel Project which is working with Wildwood has been greatly encouraged by the results of the work carried out so far: ” Anglesey may eventually be the last stand for the red squirrel in Wales and is one of a handful of long term refuges for the red squirrel in Britain as a whole. ”

Wildwood Trust’s vision is to bring back our true ‘wildwood’, a unique new way of restoring Britain’s land to its natural state. This involves releasing large wild herbivores and developing conservation grazing systems to restore natural ecological processes to help Britain team with wildlife again.

Red Squirrels are just one of the huge range of British animals that can be seen at the Wildwood Discovery Park near Canterbury. For more information visit our website at wildwoodtrust.org or telephone 0871 7820081.

Anglesey Red Squirrel Project has a Squirrel Cam at a feeding station in Anglesey.
redsquirrels.info/squirrelcam.html