The feisty little Siberian flying squirrel (Pteromys volans) has won another victory. Developers in Espoo have abandoned plans to build an estate of small detached houses in the Gumböle district of the city after the surprise discovery last summer of evidence that the endangered species may be living there.
The intention had been to open the venture to competition and build an estate of up-market dwellings. Matters were proceeding on the sale of the vacant lots when the city’s environment centre received reports that flying squirrel droppings had been found in the area.
Finland’s largest congregation of flying squirrels lives in the Nuuksio National Park area to the north of the main Helsinki-Turku motorway, and the animals are also known to frequent adjacent areas on the south side of the highway, for example in the estate of Gumböle Manor.
At present, a study of the small (and shy) creature’s whereabouts is under way between the motorway and the Outer Ring Road (Kehä III).
The Siberian flying squirrel is an endangered species, and since Finland’s accession into the European Union in 1995, it has raised its profile considerably, as the linked stories may show.
Some have complained that while the animal may be rare and endangered in the European Union, there are thousands of them just across the border in Russia. However, Brussels takes a different view.
Forest owners are irked at the possibility they will be unable to cut down their trees, as according to the EU’s Habitats Directive it is illegal to destroy or impair the breeding areas and habitat of the flying squirrel.
