Amongst the mayhem of recent lawsuits by environmental groups to ban certain types of trapping in Maine to ‘protect’ Canada lynx, much discussion has ensued on message boards, blogs and various other websites.
Many questions have risen about trapping, as a larger base of the uninformed public has started hearing more about this issue and wants more background.
In one of those discussion sessions, a young biology student provided some great answers and insight on trapping. With her permission, I’ve printed her response to some non-trapper comments below:
Since another commenter asked, I’ll tell you how you trap and release a lynx in a foothold without any damage. Trappers and biologists do it the very same way; by using a snare pole, aka catchpole or dog-catcher pole. If you’ve ever watched “Animal Cops” you’ve seen them use snare poles on housecats that are feral without any harm coming to them. Unlike coyotes, beavers and raccoons, bobcat and lynx are not trap fighters. This means that after a few initial test tugs and leaps, the bobcat/lynx settles down in a crouch and lets his camouflage hide him. They just sit there with a heavy cold bracelet on their paw. Wearing a heavy bracelet that might be chilly, depending on weather conditions, but animals have fur and tough pads on the bottom of their paws. Just how cold it is on the paw is debatable, but I know that when I ice my wrist after straining it, my discomfort comes from from the ice pack being directly on my bare skin, and lessens to a mere annoyance when I put a thin cotton sleeve on my arm. Since fur is a much better insulator than cotton, my personal belief is that a bobcat/lynx isn’t feeling significant discomfort from the trap’s temperature.
Traps themselves look like scary devices, but much like a doctor’s needle, aren’t as bad when you actually see them in action. Trappers getting their fingers caught while setting foothold traps is a common occurrence, and they do sting, but they do not break people’s fingerbones. They sting a person because human hands lack hard, tough pads and a protective layer of fur. Also, traps are usually buried under dirt, snow and/or ice, or are underwater when triggered by an animal, and lose power pushing up through these barriers. The trapper feels the full-force but the animal does not. I have never seen a bobcat with so much as broken skin in a foothold trap. The only indicator of a trap is typically fur that is creased in a line on the top of the paw. Most trappers check daily, as a trap that already has an animal in it cannot catch a new one until you remove the previous animal. The trapper wants to also re-set traps that have been fired but not caught anything to get them back in working order asap. The 24 hour check rule is useful, as it allows trappers to respond to family emergencies, etc without getting some sort of fine or penalty. The rule itself, as just explained, is not the incentive to check daily.
The traps set for bobcats, using bobcat urine and other lures, may attract lynx, but lynx are bigger, stronger animals. The small traps set for bobcats is not going to harm a lynx, which may be able to extract himself on his first surprise leap after the trap has fired. The lynx that do stay in a trap sometimes could have pulled out if they had only fought, but many times they just sit down. The trapper simply sees that he/she has caught a lynx, identifiable by the giant snowshoe paws, it’s large size and distinctive tail…and retrieves the catch-pole from his/her vehicle. Catch poles are standard equipment. While the lynx is safely restrained by the pole, the trapper then depresses the foothold’s spring with his/her boot. The lynx is now free of the trap, and the trapper can watch how it walks and bears it’s weight. If the lynx seems to be injured, in any way, or have a disease such as parvo, rabies, mange or distemper, he/she can call wildlife or game officials to come get it. If the lynx is feisty and healthy, the trapper simply opens the loop on the pole and the lynx is free.
Biologists foothold trap lynx, otter, and other species to collar, release or re-locate animals all the time. That’s right, biologists use footholds. They are simply restraining devices for land animals larger than rats/weasels. The only reason trappers are demonized is because very few people trap in the US, less than 1% of the population. The general public is ignorant about trapping, and has been made afraid of it by tales from the days of pioneers, Indian fighting and slavery. Comparing the trappers of the 1800’s to today’s trappers and calling it bad is as ridiculous as blaming today’s cotton farmers for slavery. Everybody knows a deer hunter, and can ask a deer hunter questions, but with trapping, it’s hard to find a person who does it and can answer your questions and alleviate your fears. I thought trapping was bad before I became a biology student and saw it done in the field.
Trappers do it as a hobby because they generally love nature and the outdoors, they care about species as a whole, they just don’t sentimentalize and romanticize the individual members of the species. Trappers want a healthy lynx population, and they like to assist biologists and conservation officers. Their reports on animal movements, numbers harvested in different regions, etc, helps scientists to understand this creature better. They pay license fees that support biological study and conservation.
There is absolutely no incentive for a Maine trapper to harvest a lynx, as no tannery would accept one without a CITIES tag on it, no fur buyer would risk his license and jail time over a lynx pelt, and no auction house accepts bobcat/lynx pelts that don’t have proper tags on them. Tags are provided by the state wildlife agency, and are not provided for lynx in Maine, as they are not legal harvest. The fact that trap size and trap check times are regulated by the state means the lynx is already protected when it comes to footholds. No lawsuit about it is necessary. You can release a lynx from a foothold, but you cannot release a lynx from the bumper of a car! If it really was about protecting animals, there would be a push to ban vehicles in the areas that lynx dwell. Trappers are not happy about these proposed “restrictions” because they are a thinly veiled attempt to try and stop trapping in general, for any reason.
So, if trapping is demonized wrongly, you may wonder why. Long ago a white man who called himself ‘Grey Owl” and pretended to be an Indian, lied to crowds in England about life in the new world and trapping. Even after he was exposed as a 100% Caucasian charlatan, his lies and made up horror stories about trapping persisted. His book was a best-seller, and ever since the 1800’s, groups of people have tried to make money off of an ignorant public, begging for donations to “stop horror, stop cruelty.” I’ve seen trapping done in the course of my biology study and I can tell you that it’s nothing like what the anti-trappers describe. The videos out there on places like You-Tube were animal snuff films with altered and tampered traps that were de-bunked as set-up and staged long ago. The media no longer plays such films on the news channels because the films were determined to be not genuine examples of trapping, but staged snuff films. If you examine the “Crying Shame” video on You-Tube, one can clearly see the water line of the fish-tank the film-makers were using to depict a beaver in a trap. It’s a fake setup for all of these propaganda films, and the fact that there was an attempt to submit “blogs” as evidence here makes me shake my head at just how gullible people can be. Blogs can be made by anyone, and I’m hopeful that the judge will continue to be fair concerning this matter. There’s too much hate against trappers and fur-wearers right now to expect the kind of cooperation and understanding between conservationists and trappers like there was in Teddy Roosevelt’s day, but, hopefully, with some education and awareness, trappers will be appreciated again.
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