Not very sexy, but it some may find it useful.

The following code was tested on Window 11 using the 64-bit version of strawberry 5.30.3. It was assembled by extracting the relevant bits from the Win32::FileOp module and making a simple change to account for the fact that I am using a 64-bit version of perl.

use strict;
use warnings;

use Win32::API;

sub FO_DELETE          () { 0x03 }
sub FOF_SILENT         () { 0x0004 } # don't create progress/report
sub FOF_NOCONFIRMATION () { 0x0010 } # Don't prompt the user.
sub FOF_ALLOWUNDO      () { 0x0040 } # recycle bin instead of delete
sub FOF_NOERRORUI      () { 0x0400 } # don't put up error UI

sub Recycle 
{
  # a series of null-terminated pathnames, with a double null at the e
+nd
  my $paths = join "\0", @_, "\0";
    
  my $recycle = new Win32::API('shell32', 'SHFileOperation', 'P', 'I')
+;
  my $options = FOF_ALLOWUNDO | FOF_NOCONFIRMATION | FOF_SILENT | FOF_
+NOERRORUI;
    
  # for everything except paths and options, pack with Q (rather than 
+L), since we're using 64-bit perl
  # my $opstruct = pack ('LLpLILLL', 0, FO_DELETE, $paths, 0, $options
+, 0, 0, 0);
  my $opstruct = pack ('QQpQIQQQ', 0, FO_DELETE, $paths, 0, $options, 
+0, 0, 0);

  return $recycle->Call($opstruct);
}

my $file = "C:\\Users\\James\\fish";
my $rc = Recycle($file);

print "RC: $rc\n";
[download]

Return codes are described here:

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/debug/system-error-codes--0-499-