Prince Nutkin

The British don’t all love their Royal Family, but how can one help but be fond of Royals who are so keenly devoted to preserving the sex lives of squirrels.

Let me explain.

I wrote a while ago about the plight of native English red squirrels, who have been overrun, outpaced and outfoxed, by the American grey squirrels accidentally introduced to Britain about 120 years ago. The Americans are more aggressive, better foragers, better breeders and are winning the evolutionary battle of the fittest in every forest in England.

Now, you know as well as I do that Americans would solve this problem with the help of the NRA and large shotguns, by blowing every grey squirrel they saw into tiny bits of squirrelfetti.

The British have a better solution: sugar, chocolate and hazelnuts.

They’re going to solve the problem with Nutella, a concoction made of chocolate, hazelnuts, and, mostly, sugar, lots and lots (some say 95%) of sugar.

Hearing about the Nutella plan for the first time last week on the BBC, endorsed by no less an eminent environmentalist and mumbling Royal than HRH Prince Charles, I figured the idea was to either:

1. feed the American grey squirrels Nutella to make them all obese, diabetic and too slow to compete with English reds or
2. hope the sugar content would rot their teeth out and, squirrels being ineligible for dental services under the National Health Service, force them to move to another country where the food was softer.

Nope.

The plan is to lace the Nutella with birth control chemicals!

Now all those American grey squirrels with permanent residency in the UK can gorge their brains out on Nutella while continuing to screw their brains out like, well, like squirrels! (Presumably, HRH is hoping the English red squirrels have palates too refined to eat Nutella, although the photo clearly proves otherwise.)

As always, British thoughtfulness and good manners come to the fore.