With respect to the recent tragic loss of a dog in the Nakusp area to a legal trap set in a front country area (and near a provincial park), I don’t believe, as one writer submitted, that all dogs on crown land need to be on a leash. If so that is news to me.
The conflicts between trappers and people’s pets, including dogs, being part of the trappers’ “incidental catch” has been around for a long time. Our government is remiss in not adopting more proactive policies that recognize that a lot more people are using front country areas and some back country areas today, including walking their dogs, than in the good old days.
Current regulations and policies are nothing more than antiquated, favour only the trapper, and will only continue to create more lost pets and escalating conflicts if not updated.
People should be writing to the Minister of Environment asking that traplines bordering front country rural and residential areas should no longer be allowed, and current boundaries of existing traplines should be adjusted to reflect that.
Many of the animals that are caught such as pine marten, fishers, lynx, wolverine etc. are ones that many of us prefer to see in the wilds, even if it is only their tracks. These fur bearers should be left alone in front country areas where we live and recreate, for people to enjoy – there’s still lots of back country for trappers to carry our their activities.
Additionally, where traplines overlap with winter recreation activities in the back country, notices should be posted that there is an active trapline in the area and any traps along recreation corridors used by the public should by law be legally posted, as people also take their dogs in the back country.
Last but not least, and as I learned when I was a boy and went out with “Tony the Trapper” (i.e. Krasovic) on his trap line in the Sandon Area in the 1950s, the public should be aware of the “incidental by-catch” of innocent birds including Stellar’s Jays, Grey Jays, and various of the resident wood hawks including the listed Northern Goshawk. Go in any trapline area in the summer and you will see their feathers laying near some of the “sets.” I suspect that now that Bald Eagles have returned to our area, that some of them may also be the unfortunate victims of front country traplines.
Wayne McCrory, Wildlife biologist
Hills, B.C.
