View to a cull: is grey squirrel the ultimate sustainable meat?

A London chef with a mind of his own has the internet in a furry flurry with news that he has put grey squirrel ragu on the menu. Ivan Tisdall-Downes, who runs Native in Borough Market, also does a delicate grey squirrel pie, with sweet pickled onion relish. One of the main selling points for this meaty option is that it is supposedly sustainable. As omnivorous customers increasingly look to environmentally friendly and wild sources of meat, game is attractive. And game that was going to be hunted and killed anyway, whether people wanted to eat it or not – such as the grey squirrel – is as good as it gets.

Now, conservationists across the country agree that curbing the grey squirrel population – or eradicating it, as Prince Charles, a trustee for the Red Squirrel Survival Trust, has advocated – is crucial to the survival of the reds. Of course, eating it raises a number of questions; the Wildlife Trusts – which, under the Red Squirrel United banner, is leading Europe’s largest invasive species-management programme – won’t be drawn on whether eating grey squirrel meat is ethical or not.

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For some chefs and food campaigners, a cull with no other end in sight than killing results in animals – ie food – being wasted. Hence, the view that grey squirrel is the ultimate in ethical meat eating. Tisdall-Downes learned to cook it at River Cottage HQ, whose former head chef, Tim Maddams – author of the River Cottage Game Cookery Book – has long been a fan of the ingredient. In the introduction, Maddams describes himself as a hunter and a committed ethical foodie – to his mind, shooting and preparing game yourself fosters deep respect.

When it comes to grey squirrel, Robert Gooch, the owner of The Wild Meat Company, says he can’t think of a more sustainable product: beyond the culling aspect, grey squirrel requires none of the human intervention and energy consumption that the production of farmed meat does. He has been selling squirrel for 15 years – on the website and in farm shops and local co-ops – and demand has steadily risen.

Of course, animal rights activists argue that cruelty-free meat does not exist. And learning how grey squirrels are culled, you can see their point. As well as shooting there is live trapping, which then requires the animals be hit to death. As the squirrels are classed as vermin, they can be killed year-round, meaning lactating mothers can die, and their dependent youngsters starve. Beyond that, there are the (admittedly few and far between) detractors of the cull at large, for whom it is not only a pointless exercise – it borders on the xenophobic, but that’s a whole other can of worms.