198 THE ESSEX NATURALIST.
Bedfordshire.—The mother colony at Woburn has already
been mentioned and from this centre the squirrels have dispersed
themselves throughout the county and beyond its confines.
Mr. J. Steel Elliott says that their present census in the county
would run into thousands. At Woburn they are greatly reduced
by trapping and are kept within reasonable bounds; as many
as three hundred have been killed in one week and one thousand
in a winter. I am told that the Duke of Bedford gave away
squirrels in many parts of the British Isles for a time, but a record
was not kept.
Cambridgeshire.—The infrequent specimens found are
said to be wanderers from Bedfordshire, but Mr. Wm. Farren,
the taxidermist at Cambridge, has not known more than three
in the county in about fifteen years.
Norfolk.—Grey squirrels from Woburn were sent to this
county some years ago (previous to 1914), but I have not suc-
ceeded in tracing them and the species is unknown in the county
at present.
Huntingdonshire.—Areas in this county are said to be
over-run by the grey squirrel,26 but I have no particulars.
Northamptonshire.—Thanks to kind replies from Mr. H. N.
Dixon and Mr. Fred Bostock to my enquiries the localities
occupied in Northants can be named. Grey squirrels first ap-
peared about ten years ago, the source not being known, and
they are now found at Salcey Forest, Wakefield Lawn, Castle
Ashby and Stoke Park, Stoke Bruerne, in all of which the num-
bers are increasing. There is also a record for Weston, near
Towcester.27 In the Oundle and Biggen districts Lord Lilford
reports that the species is unknown.
Warwickshire.—I have a solitary but interesting note
applying to the city of Birmingham:—"A gentleman who lived
"near the top of the Hagley Road, Edgbaston, Birmingham,
"kept a number of grey squirrels, about twenty, for many years
"in his grounds [this was more than nine years ago], but there
"came a day when these pretty little animals had to find other
"homes, for their owner left to go to another town, and before
"he went he let the squirrels loose, and in time they were seen
"in the trees of various estates. Some gradually worked their
"way to one or two gardens in the Wellington Road, where they
26 N.B. The Field, 30th October, 1919.
27 Mr. O. V. Aplin, Zoologist, August 1916, p. 312.