Grey squirrels are culled across the UK to protect recovering red squirrel populations, creating genuine ethical complexity about lethal control of one native-equivalent species to benefit another. Welfare of culled grey squirrels raises animal ethics questions.
Grey squirrels killed in control programs experience the welfare harms of their specific killing method. Spring traps designed to kill rapidly can cause wounding if not perfectly positioned. Lethal cage traps require operators to dispatch animals humanely after capture. The ethical complexity of killing grey squirrels to protect red squirrels is genuine: both are sentient vertebrates, but only one is native and protected. The development of contraceptive bait would eliminate this welfare conflict if proven effective and deployable.