How to choose if an animal lives or dies
By Dr Jacqui Wilmshurst, Speaker at the Annual Oxford Animal Ethics Summer School and founder of Nala’s Nook Squirrel & Corvid Sanctuary
I hold a licence from Natural England, to keep grey squirrels in captivity “for welfare purposes”. These licences came into effect in December 2019, after the previous licences enabling holders to release them back into the wild were revoked for conservation reasons. The wording on the licence, of keeping them captive “for welfare purposes”, implies that having a life in captivity is better for them than the only alternative of having them killed via euthanasia.
Meanwhile, all other guidance for wildlife rehabilitators in Britain is explicit in stating that no wild animal should be kept in permanent captivity. This, therefore, puts any owner of a licensed sanctuary for wild animals in a difficult position: caught between keeping animals permanently captive who cannot legally be returned to the wild, as a preferable alternative to death, while also being told that it is not acceptable to do so. In deciding between the two, we are forced to weigh up their right to life against their right to death, and somehow to work out what is best on their behalf.
Bella’s story
A young grey squirrel (about 12 weeks old) was being kicked around in a city park by a group of boys when a man passing by saw and intervened. He scooped her up and drove to the closest rescue centre, who brought her to me as the only sanctuary in the area equipped to take her in.
I rushed her straight to the vet, who confirmed my initial fears – she had suffered a spinal injury and was unlikely to regain full use of her back legs. I had to decide whether to provide her an opportunity for rehabilitation, for a life of permanent captivity, or have her ‘put to sleep’.
Would she be better off dead because she’s a member of an invasive non-native species? Would she be better off dead because she can’t return to the wild? Would she be better off dead because she’s physically disabled? Can a disabled, wild born, wild animal ever have quality of life in permanent captivity?
Conventional scientific opinion tells us that we can’t effectively ask animals what they want. At the same time, in the world of wildlife rehabilitation there isn’t a universally agreed method to make decisions on whether an animal is better off alive or dead.
Not today
Grey squirrels are enormously resilient animals, which is partly why they have been so successful at adapting to our ecosystems and habitats after being brought here from their native range in the eastern USA. I have spent several years working with them, rearing them, and caring for them, and I know how to spot a fierce will to live. When I was with this squirrel at the vet, that light was shining brightly in her eyes despite all that she had been through. So, following a lengthy discussion with the vet, the decision at that moment in time was simply: “Not today”.
We gave her the strongest available pain relief, and I took her home. I named her Bella.
Once home and settled in a secure cage with a heat pad and plenty of food and water, it was just the next day that I witnessed her using her still soft baby teeth to try with all her might to get through the shell of a hazelnut. Again, I thought, “not today”.
I left food for her, and put her medication into that, but largely left her alone. She rested most of the time but ate well. Her coat was shiny, and her eyes remained bright. “Not today”.
A few days later, she emerged from her pile of blankets and started climbing the bars, looking to explore and to engage with the world again. I moved her into a larger enclosure, and she climbed some more, using her body to the limit of its abilities. “Not today”.
Then she started to play, so I gave her some toys, and she played even more. “Not today”.
I noticed that she was pulling her head to one side, the way they do when they scratch with a back leg and realised she needed some help. I used a toothbrush through the bars, and she attacked it repeatedly. Not because she was afraid, but because she had a good sense of her own boundaries and needs. “Not today”.
With perseverance, and a lot of broken toothbrushes, she eventually let me show her how good it was to have help with scratching. She started to seek out the toothbrush. “Not today”.
She is now three years old and currently thriving. Her life is still lived day by day, and one day I could find myself having to say “yes, today”, if ever I feel that the evidence does not add up to a quality of life. But that choice will be hers and mine together.
Hard choices
Not all animals who have come to my sanctuary have had the opportunity for a continued life. For some, when healing is not possible and long-term suffering is guaranteed, and when that bright light in the eyes has gone out, I have made the heartbreaking decision that they are now indeed better off dead.
While I continue to explore the options, for all the animals in my care, my choice is to value each life as an individual, simply because it’s theirs.
While I am not naïve about the problems in our wider ecosystems (and in fact work professionally as a conservation psychologist), I do not see grey squirrels as ‘pests’. Does that mean I consider those that live here to be ‘pets’? Absolutely not. They have a bite force of 7,000psi (look it up), they are not cuddly as adults, and they will destroy most things that they can reach with their teeth. They are very much wild animals, and they are not here to be my companions.
Instead, my enjoyment comes through the immense privilege of getting to know individuals personally and learning about their species through these relationships – what they need, what they are capable of, how they communicate. Also, what they teach me about myself as a human animal.
As a doctoral researcher at The Open University, I now explore these questions, and more, in great depth. Thankfully, an increasing number of researchers are doing the same, across a range of academic fields and in relationship with many different species and contexts.
I work through a ‘care ethical’ lens. Instead of approaching these difficult decisions in a generalised, rational and detached way, I approach them through my own relationship with the individual animal, the context, and the situation. I absorb all that I can learn from the animal, while also recognising that who I am (including being a licensed sanctuary owner with expertise and resources), and the relationship I have with each animal, makes a difference in what choices I can make.
In their 2025 Kindness Index survey, the RSPCA revealed that 61% (up from 56% in 2024) of respondents think protecting wildlife should be the top priority for the RSPCA. Up to 60% (it varied by region) said they did not feel confident in knowing how to help if they found sick, injured or orphaned wildlife in need.
We can all make a contribution in our own way. This is mine. Working with both squirrels and birds who cannot return to the wild, I question what I do every day, and I don’t have most of the answers. What I do know is that being a member of a non-native species, being disabled, and being unable to return to the wild will never, at my sanctuary, be automatic criteria for being better off dead.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
This topic was first presented, by Dr Jacqui Wilmshurst at the Annual Oxford Animal Ethics Summer School. The Summer School is organised by the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics, an independent centre pioneering ethical perspectives on animals through academic research, teaching, and publication. The Centre comprises more than 100 academic Fellows worldwide and hosts the annual Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics Summer School, now in its tenth year. The Revd. Professor Andrew Linzey, Director of the Centre is the subject of a new documentary called ‘The Animal Thing’.
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