Saving Squirrel Nutkin

The red squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris) has been a cultural icon in Britain at least since the beginning of the 20th century, when Beatrix Potter penned a children's tale about Squirrel Nutkin, an impertinent little chap who lived with his large extended family "in a wood at the edge of a lake." In Potter's day, red squirrels were a familiar sight in parks and gardens across Britain, but no longer. In recent decades, their population has been in catastrophic decline.