Saving Scotland’s Red Squirrels has released the results of its fifth annual Great Scottish Squirrel Survey, revealing that 2023 public participation was the second highest since its inception, beating all previous years, bar the record-breaking pandemic lockdown year of 2020. According to the survey, which was conducted between the 2nd and 8th of October […]
Category: Blog
Speaking up for Red Squirrels in the Consultation on Scotland’s Strategic Framework for Biodiversity
The Scottish Government recently launched a consultation on tackling the nature emergency and are seeking public feedback by 14 December. This is one of the biggest proposals for high level policy changes ever seen in Scotland, and responding is an action open to everyone which could make a fundamental difference to the future of […]
Southern Uplands Partnership Guest Blog: Funding Success for Red Squirrel Recovery Network
Southern Uplands Partnership is delighted to announce that the Red Squirrel Recovery Network project, an ambitious cross-border red squirrel conservation initiative, has received development funding* from The National Lottery Heritage Fund to progress plans for a 5-year project. The project is led by Northumberland Wildlife Trust working in partnership with the Cumbrian Wildlife Trust, […]
Q&A with Sarah Woodfin, Project Manager with Trees for Life’s Red Squirrel Reintroduction Project
Charity Trees for Life has been working since 1993 to restore previously lost native habitats and species to the Scottish Highlands. Since 2016 their Red Squirrel Reintroduction Project has worked to help red squirrels repopulate areas where they had previously gone extinct, translocating more than 200 red squirrels to 10 new areas in the northwest […]
Simple tricks for telling your reds from your greys
As we celebrate the fifth annual Great Scottish Squirrel Survey (running from the 2nd – 8th October), when recording those all-important sightings, how can we ensure that the squirrels we’re spotting are indeed the species we believe? When a sighting is brief – perhaps seen from a moving vehicle, or a fleeting glimpse of […]
Introducing the new Eastern Lowlands Red Squirrel Group
In February 2023 the Eastern Lowlands Red Squirrel Group (ELRSG) was established with funding through the Red Squirrel Survival Trust. It is an independent group from Saving Scotland’s Red Squirrels as the project does not cover this area. The Eastern Lowlands includes the Kingdom of Fife, Clackmannanshire, part of Stirling and parts of Perth and […]
North East Volunteer Spotlight: Celebrating our volunteer Janice Drew as she moves on to pastures new!
As one of our dedicated volunteers lays down her tools we talk to Dr Emma Sheehy, Eradication Scientific Lead for our north east project region, about why volunteers make such a difference to the work she and her team are undertaking, and we hear from Janice about what she got up to and loved […]
2023 #InvasiveSpeciesWeek Wrap Up
All week we have been taking part in the UK’s 2023 #InvasiveSpeciesWeek, raising awareness of the threat of grey squirrels to Scotland’s native reds.Read below for a summary of all of our thoughts this week, detailing what invasive non-native species are, why they are a problem, what SSRS is doing, and how you can help. […]
Faces Old and New at Saving Scotland’s Red Squirrels
We are now one year into our 2022-24 Transition Project, and there have been a fair few changes here at Saving Scotland’s Red Squirrels! In our first staffing update of the new phase we are please to (re)introduce all our staff across the country, and give an overview as to our roles and activities within […]
Hawick, Selkirk and Denholm Red Squirrel Network – One Year Later
Saving Scotland Red Squirrels: Developing Community Action ran from 2017 – 2022. One of the aims of this phase of the project was to set up and equip a network of volunteer groups in South Scotland capable of independently taking forward red squirrel conservation in the region. As such, in April 2022, 13 of the […]