Squirrelling away the cash

The grey squirrel cull in the north of Scotland is a waste of money (Sure he's cute, 9 February). Grey squirrels have the ability to reproduce within weeks and quickly move into areas that have been "cleared", so the claim they can be exterminated over a wide area is nonsense. Conservationists say grey squirrels are the "cause" of the red squirrel decline through the transmission of squirrel-pox virus, but there is no firm evidence for this.

In Merseyside, a buffer zone has been in place for several years where grey squirrels are killed. But increased human exploitation of red squirrels for tourism and the frequent intrusion by conservationists for monitoring population levels has led to stress and loss of condition of the shy and reclusive animals, resulting in an increased susceptibility to disease. In short, fewer grey squirrels, with more conservation and tourist intrusion, has resulted in a massive decline in the red squirrel population - definitely not the predicted outcome.

It is not insignificant that the greatest number of red squirrels in the UK live in the least human-populated areas - the Highlands of Scotland.
Angus Macmillan
Balloch, Dunbartonshire

Are the government and conservationist bodies confusing nationalism with conservation? Rather than protecting genuinely endangered species such as the shrill carder bee, which performs economically vital pollination, the attention instead is placed upon the protection of the red squirrel, which is shown as being of the least concern in the International Union for the Conservation of Nature red list. Is it not the case that we are attempting to preserve banal subtle forms of national identity, depicted for instance in our shared common cultural stories, such as Squirrel Nutkin? Do we see the grey squirrel as an alien, not part of our national story?
Michael Norbury
Reader in geography, Newcastle University