Roxy, an 8-year-old heeler mix, died in 2018 after being strangled by a snare at Santa Cruz Lake Recreation Area.

A Chimayó man accused of setting a snare trap that caused the death of a dog named Roxy, which sparked a law outlawing trapping on public lands, has been found not guilty on all charges related to the 2018 incident.

“It’s a sense of relief, obviously,” Marty Cordova said in a phone interview Thursday. “It’s been about three years I’ve had this burden on my shoulders. It feels really good to get this behind me.”

A jury in District Court in Santa Fe deliberated for about six hours over two days before finding Cordova not guilty Wednesday on all counts, defense attorney Yvonne Quintana said in a phone interview Thursday.

Cordova was charged with multiple counts of violating state laws regarding trapping fur-bearing animals, including trapping within 25 yards of a public road, failing to have identifying information on his traps and failing to check his traps daily.

Cordova, 44, found himself in the middle of a heated controversy over wildlife management and originally faced more than 30 criminal counts after Roxy — an 8-year-old heeler mix owned by Dave Clark of Española — was caught in a snare trap near Santa Cruz Lake.

The case subsequently spurred the passage of a new law — the Wildlife Conservation and Public Safety Act, also called Roxy’s Law, which takes effect in April. It outlaws trapping on public lands.

Clark declined to comment Thursday.

But he told The New Mexican in 2019 he’d been hiking with Roxy near the lake, a reservoir about 15 miles east of Española, when the dog was caught in the trap.

“She was behind me and running to catch up,” Clark said. “I heard this sound and I turned around. She’d been caught in a snare trap. I couldn’t figure how to get it off. She was strangled while I was trying to remove it.”

As he was carrying his dog back to his truck, he said he heard another noise and found a bobcat caught in another trap. A game warden later euthanized the bobcat, he said.

According to an affidavit for a search warrant, a state Game and Fish Officer said that after removing the trap, he noticed there was no identification on the device, as required by state law. Surveillance cameras eventually captured images of Cordova checking and removing traps in the area.

After identifying him from surveillance camera images, Game and Fish officers served a search warrant on Cordova’s residence, resulting in the seizure of multiple snares and foothold traps that were not properly marked, according to the affidavit.

Quintana said she got the case dismissed at the Magistrate Court level based on challenges to the evidence, but the First Judicial District Attorney’s office filed the case in District Court as an appeal.

Cordova had faced 34 misdemeanor counts of violating laws regarding the trapping of fur-bearers in the Magistrate Court case, court records show.

The number was reduced to 23 counts when it was refiled in District Court, and it had been reduced to 10 counts by the time Cordova’s trial started Monday after more than a dozen counts were dismissed based on problems with evidence.

“It’s unfortunate the Game Department keeps doing this to individuals,” Cordova said. “I was fortunate I had the means to be able to defend myself, but that’s not common with many individuals that get accused of such things, and they have to take a lesser plea or plead guilty.”

“I think it is the right outcome,” Quintana said. “The case was overcharged, and the state and [Game and Fish Department] officers really did a disservice in regards to losing evidence.”

Game and Fish deleted thousands of photographs related to the case, Quintana said, adding other pieces of evidence — such as parts of the trap that snared Roxy — were lost.

While many of the counts against Cordova accused him of not putting identifying information on his traps, Quintana said the state didn’t collect a single trap from the field as evidence and only had traps they’d taken from Cordova’s home.

Quintana also said the dog was not on a leash as required in the Santa Cruz recreation area.

“So while the traps may have been at fault for the loss of the dog, there was also that issue that if the dog had been controlled with a leash, the tragic loss of the domestic pet may never have occurred,” she said.

District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies disputed Quintana’s contention that the case was overcharged and said some of the evidence had been lost by the Bureau of Land Management during that agency’s investigation.

Carmack-Altwies wrote some of the unmarked traps allegedly belonging to Cordova “were left in the field where Game Cameras were set by BLM and Game and Fish for them to observe and try to identify who was setting these traps.

“However, all traps collected at the Defendant’s home … were presented,” she wrote. “There were 7 foothold traps and 3 snares collected … and none of them had tags at the time. One snare that could have been collected was destroyed because they had to cut it off of Roxy (the dead dog) to remove her body from the scene.”

The District Attorney wrote she felt she had the evidence to prove the charges when the case went to trial, but state District Court Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer’s rulings “immediately before and during trial” limited what the jury was able to hear and see.

“The State fought hard for accountability and what the jury did see and hear was heartbreaking testimony and evidence about how Roxy and her owner suffered,” Carmack-Altwies wrote.

Quintana said the case was one of the toughest she’s tried when it came to choosing a jury because of the strong opinions many potential jurors held regarding trapping and animal rights.

Three jury panels had to be vetted before the parties were able to agree on 14 jurors — 12, plus two alternates — to hear the case, she said.

“It was very inflammatory because the dog got killed,” she said, adding potential jurors seemed more “stirred up” about the case than they were about a murder trial for which a jury also was being chosen.

While she’s no fan of trapping, Quintana said the law passed as a result of Roxy’s death “changes a way of life in New Mexico that is traditional, historic and has been practiced for hundreds of years.”

Cordova — a utility manager at Los Alamos National Laboratory, where he’s worked for the past 21 years — said he has a small farm in Chimayó where coyotes and other predators sometimes kill his chickens, and he traps them as a form of population control.

He said activists who pushed for the passage of Roxy’s Law used him to accomplish something that had been on their agenda for some time.

“They used me as a scapegoat to say, ‘Look at how bad sportsmen are, and look at the results of trapping,’ ” he said. “They used my name to pass a law they’d been trying to pass for year and years and they continue to slander my name.

“They were able to convince legislators trapping is bad,” Cordova said. “Trapping is not bad; it’s a means of conservation, just like hunting deer or fishing. But you mention the word trapping or anything, and they hate that. But when Fido or your cat gets stolen from your back yard by a coyote, then they want all the coyotes killed. Sportsmen keep that population in check, but most people don’t understand that and just view us as killers and inhumane, and that is not the case. That’s not who we are.”

Read this article in the Santa Fe New Mexican 

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Robert Harrison, Ph.D, University of New Mexico^[1]

December, 2020

Summary:  Wildlife enthusiasts are well aware of the potential of leghold traps to severely injure wild animals.  Less appreciated is how many wild animals suffer such injuries in the course of an average trapping season.  I used leghold trap injury rates reported in published studies combined with the numbers of animals reported caught by the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish to estimate the number of wild animals injured annually in New Mexico. Based upon an average reported catch (harvest) and an average estimated catch (based upon harvest reporting rates) of 10,846 and 12,893 animals, respectively, from 2010 through 2020, I estimate that 5,315 to 6,318 animals in New Mexico annually suffer serious or severe injuries such as broken bones, severed tendons, deep cuts, dislocated joints, and broken teeth.

The use of leghold traps (a.k.a. foothold or steel traps) has drawn controversy for decades^1,2,3.  Efforts to find more humane alternatives for animal capture began at least as early as the 1940’s⁴.  Studies have compared injury rates of traditional leghold traps with modified leghold traps and other types of traps (Notes 5-19).  Studies used in this report were published in peer-reviewed scientific journals, primarily the Journal of Wildlife Management and the Wildlife Society Bulletin, which are the two premier journals of the wildlife management profession.  To simplify this brief report, I do not include scientific names for animals and use common terms for injuries rather than medical jargon.

The New Mexico Department of Game and Fish (NMDGF) allows the use of traditional leghold traps of jaw spread less than seven inches²⁰.  The only required modifications are a 3/16″ offset (gap) between the jaws when the trap is closed if the jaw spread is less than or equal to 5-1/2,” and lamination if trap jaw spread is between 6-1/2 and 7″.  It is unknown how many New Mexico trappers use offset traps, other types of traps, or traps with additional modifications.  For these reasons, I assume for this report that all New Mexico trappers use traditional leghold traps with a 3/16″ offset.

Many different species have been included in injury studies, with coyotes being the most common.  Other species included in the studies reviewed here were red, gray, and arctic foxes, bobcats, raccoons, wolves, opossums, skunks, dogs, cats, porcupines, groundhogs, weasels, sheep, squirrels, and snowshoe hares.

Several systems to rate the severity of injuries have been used.  The two most common are a simple four-level system and a point system.  In the four-level system, Level One includes no or slight injuries, Level Two includes moderate swelling, chipped teeth, and small cuts, Level Three includes medium cuts with damage to underlying tissues, minor joint dislocations, broken teeth, hairline fractures, and one or less toe bone broken.  Level Four includes deep cuts, swelling that prevents an animal from using the injured limb, severed tendons, major joint dislocations, frozen feet, and broken bones.  Level Three is considered serious injury, and Level Four is considered severe injury.

In the point system, points are given for each injury⁸.  For example, 5 points for minor swelling and bleeding, 20 points for tendon and ligament cuts, 50 points for major joint dislocation, 75 points for compound fractures near the wrist or ankle, 200 points for compound fractures away from the wrist or ankle, and 400 points for amputated limbs.  Points are added for each injury to yield a total score for each animal.  Total scores of 50-100 are considered to be serious, and total scores over 100 are considered to be severe.

Most studies employed veterinary pathologists to perform thorough necropsies, including the use of x-rays.  A few, mainly older, studies used external evaluations by non-veterinarians.  The latter studies most likely underestimated the extent of injuries.

The average percentage of caught animals receiving serious and severe injuries reported by those studies using the four-level system or an equivalent was 49% (range 24-86%, 11 studies).  The average injury score from studies using the point system was 94 (range 44-150, 7 studies).  A score of 94 is very serious and nearly severe.

Figures presented in the previous paragraph were from studies of traps with no offset.  The number of studies including offset traps is very limited.  One other study that included traps with an offset of 1/5″ reported an average injury score of 80¹⁶.  A second study reported a serious or severe injury percentage of 41% for unmodified traps and a serious or severe injury rate of 38% for traps offset by 1/12″¹⁸.  To my knowledge, no significant advantage from offsetting has been reported.  I found no studies of lamination.

For comparison, guidelines issued by the Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies (AFWA) include criteria for approval for the use of specific traps for specific species²¹.  AFWA conducted injury studies on various species using a variety of traps.  One set of criteria required that average total injury scores must be 55 or less.  The other set allowed 30% of animals to suffer serious or severe injuries.  The former criterium does not indicate what percentage of animals suffer scores of more than 55.  These criteria are stricter than the average injury rates found for traditional leghold traps in the studies reviewed here.  However, there is no requirement by NMDGF that trappers adhere to the guidelines or use recommended traps.

AFWA guidelines approved specific traps for specific target species.  There was no consideration of injuries to captured non-target animals.  Although there are modifications available to traps that prevent animals below a certain weight from being captured, such modifications are not required by NMDGF, and trappers are unlikely to use them.  Smaller animals caught may suffer far more severe injuries than larger animals in the same trap.  One study which focused on coyotes reported that snowshoe hares had an average total injury score of 209, and smaller animals such as squirrels were usually found dead¹⁰.

There are two methods available to estimate the numbers of furbearering animals caught in New Mexico each year.  Trappers are required to report their catches, leading to a reported total catch (harvest).  However, not all trappers report.  Accounting for the percentage of trappers not reporting leads to an estimated total catch (= reported catch/reporting fraction).  The actual numbers of animals caught lies in between the two estimates.

Based upon NMDGF published Furbearer Harvest Reports²² from the 2010/2011 through the 2019/2020 seasons, the average number of furbearers reported caught was 10,846 per year.  The estimated average number of furbearers caught based upon reporting rates was 12,893 per year²³.  These figures include red, gray, kit, and swift foxes, badgers, beavers, coyotes, bobcats, ermines, weasels, muskrats, nutrias, raccoons, and ringtails (See Note 24 for treatment of coyotes and skunks).  At an average serious or severe injury rate of 49%, between 5,315 and 6,318 wild animals received serious or severe injuries as a result of being caught in a leghold trap.  At an average injury score of 94, most animals received serious or severe injuries.  These high rates of injury are what prompted the many studies of alternatives to traditional leghold traps.

It is impossible for most people to fully understand the experience of a trapped animal, injured and vulnerable to attack by larger predators.  We do know that trapped animals experience significant levels of stress, as shown by increased levels of hormones, serum chemicals, and immune system activity^{25, 26}.  Given that all mammals, including ourselves, have similar nervous and endocrine systems and brain structure, it is fair to say that the reactions that trapped animals have to being in pain and in fear for their lives would be quite similar to the agony and horror we ourselves would feel in a similar situation.  Certainly, soldiers in combat, severely wounded and exposed to enemy fire, would understand.  In New Mexico, the extent of these grisly misfortunes can only be described as horrendous.

Notes:

1. Muth, R. M., R. R. Zwick, M. E. Mather, J. F. Organ, J. J. Daigle, and S. A. Jonker.  2006.  Unnecessary source of pain and suffering or necessary management tool: Attitudes of conservation professionals toward outlawing leghold traps.  Wildlife Society Bulletin 34(3):706-715.
2. Andelt, W. F., R. L. Phillips, R. H. Schmidt, and R. Bruce Gill. 1999.  Trapping furbearers: an overview of the biological and social issues surrounding a public policy controversy.  Wildlife Society Bulletin 27(1):53-64.
3. Proulx, G., M. Cattet, T. L. Serfass, and S. E. Baker. 2020.  Updating the AIHTS trapping standards to improve animal welfare and capture efficiency and selectivity.  Animals 10:1262; doi:10.3390/ani10081262.
4. Robinson, W. B. 1943.  The “Humane Coyote-Getter” vs. the Steel Trap in Control of Predatory Animals.  Journal of Wildlife Management 7(2):179-189.
5. Linhart, S. B., G. J. Dasch and F. J. Turkowski. 1981. The steel leg-hold trap: Techniques for reducing foot injury and increasing selectivity.  Pp. 1560-1578 in J. A. Chapman and D. Pursley, eds. Worldwide Furbearer Conference Proceedings.  R. R. Connelley & Sons, Co., Falls Church, VA.
6. Novak, M. 1981. The foot-snare and the leg-hold traps: A comparison.  Pp. 1671-1685 in J. A. Chapman and D. Pursley, eds. Worldwide Furbearer Conference Proceedings.  R. R. Connelley & Sons, Co., Falls Church, VA.
7. Englund, J. 1982. A comparison of injuries to leg-hold trapped and foot-snared red foxes.  Journal of Wildlife Management 46(4):1113-1117.
8. Olsen, G. H., S. B. Linhart, R. A. Holmes, G. J. Dasch, and C. B. Male. 1986.  Injuries to coyotes caught in padded and unpadded steel foothold traps.  Wildlife Society Bulletin 14(3):219-223.
9. Olsen, G. H., R. G. Linscombe, V. L. Wright, and R. A. Holmes. 1988. Reducing injuries to terrestrial furbearers by using padded foothold traps.  Wildlife Society Bulletin 16(3):303-307.
10. Onderka, D. K., D. L. Skinner and A. W. Todd. 1990.  Injuries to coyotes and other species caused by four models of footholding devices.  Wildlife Society Bulletin 18(2):175-182.
11. Phillips, R. L., F. S. Blom, G. J. Dasch, and J. W. Guthrie. 1992.  Field evaluation of three types of coyote traps.  Pages 393-395 in J. E. Borrecco and R. E. Marsh, eds.  Proceedings of the Fifteenth Vertebrate Pest Conference.  Newport Beach, California, USA.
12. Warburton, B. 1992. Victor foot-hold traps for catching Australian brushtail possums in New Zealand: capture efficiency and injuries. Wildlife Society Bulletin 20(1):67-73.
13. Proulx, G., I. M. Pawlina, D. K. Onderka, M. J. Badry and K. Seidel. 1994.  Field evaluation of the number 1 1/2 steel-jawed leghold and the Sauvageau 2001-8 traps to humanely capture arctic fox.  Wildlife Society Bulletin 22(2):179-183.
14. Phillips, R. L. 1996. Evaluation of three types of snares for capturing coyotes.  Wildlife Society Bulletin 24(1):107-110.
15. Hubert, G. F. Jr., L. L. Hungerford, G. Proulx, R. D. Bluett, and L. Bowman. 1996.  Evaluation of two restraining traps to capture raccoons.  Wildlife Society Bulletin 24(4):699-708.
16. Hubert, G. F., Jr., L. L. Hungerford, and R. D. Bluett. 1997.  Injuries to coyotes captured in modified foothold traps.  Wildlife Society Bulletin 25(4):858-863.
17. Earle, R. D., D. M. Lunning, V. R. Tuovila, and J. A. Shivik. 2003.  Evaluating injury mitigation and performance of #3 Victor Soft Catch® traps to restrain bobcats.  Wildlife Society Bulletin 31(3):617:629.
18. Frame, P. F., and T. J. Meier. 2007.  Field-assessed injury to wolves captured in rubber-padded traps.  Journal of Wildlife Management 71(6):2074-2076.
19. Turnbull, T. T., J. W. Cain, III, and G. W. Roemer. 2011.  Evaluating trapping techniques to reduce potential for injury to Mexican wolves.  Unpublished report to NMDGF.  Open file report 2011-1190.  USGS.
20. NMDGF 2020-2021 New Mexico Furbearers Rules and Information. General Rules. Page 12.  Restrictions applying to all traps that could reasonably be expected to catch a furbearer.  Size Restrictions.  www.wildlife.state.nm.us/hunting/information-by-animal/furbearers.  Accessed 22 December, 2020.
21. Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies. 2006.  Best Management Practices for trapping in the United States.  Page 5.  www.fishwildlife.org/application/files/3515/1862/6191/Introduction_BMPs.pdf.  Accessed 22 December, 2020.
22. NMDGF Harvest Reports. www.wildlife.state.nm.us/hunting/information-by-animal/furbearers.  Accessed 22 December, 2020.
23. The average reporting rate from 2010/2011 through 2019/2020 was 82.3%.
24. Coyotes and skunks caught by trappers have not been recorded by NMDGF since 2014. To estimate their numbers, I applied the average catch from 2010/2011 through 2013/2014 to 2014/2015 through 2019/2020.  Average reported catches applied were 5006 for coyotes and 443 for skunks.  Average estimated catches applied were 6177 for coyotes and 553 for skunks.
25. Kreeger, T. J., P. J. White, U. S. Seal, and J. R. Tester. 1990. Pathological responses of red foxes to foothold traps.  Journal of Wildlife Management 54(1):147-160.
26. White, P. J., T. J. Kreeger, U. S. Seal, and J. R. Tester. 1991. Pathological responses of red foxes to capture in box traps.  Journal of Wildlife Management 55(1):75-80.

[1] Dr. Robert Harrison is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the Biology Department of the University of New Mexico and a native of New Mexico.  His Ph.D research was a study of the effects of residential development on gray foxes in New Mexico.  He has published over 40 peer-reviewed articles on bobcats, swift, kit, red, and gray foxes, badgers, ringtails, and rabbits, and has followed furbearer trapping issues in New Mexico for 28 years. 

The post Injuries to New Mexico Wildlife Caught in Leghold Traps appeared first on TrapFree New Mexico.

On a warm November morning, a man taking a stroll through the amazing trails south of Santa Teresa discovered a pile of some forty dumped animals. What he first thought were dead greyhounds turned out to be coyotes. They had been killed and skinned, and left with only a little fur on their legs. The carcasses were left to unceremoniously decay in the desert. Wounds on their paws indicated that this was the heinous work of trappers.

This gruesome scene is the common outcome of trapping, but is rarely witnessed by the public. Trapping is legal in New Mexico, and is widespread on public lands. A license only costs $20 through the Department of Game and Fish, but the real cost is paid by the public and by our ecosystems. Over the years, dozens of companion animals have been victims of traps on public lands. Coyotes are a common target, but a range of species, including bobcats, beavers, badgers and foxes are killed by the thousands every year so that a tiny group of New Mexicans can profit from taking away something we all love.

As a native New Mexican, I know that our state’s public lands have some of the most beautiful scenery and landscapes. They are also home to an incredibly diverse array of wildlife, and these species are all important parts of interconnected ecosystems. Healthy ecosystems clean our air, maintain our soil, regulate climate, and recycle nutrients that provide us with food. Animals such as coyotes and foxes keep rodent populations in check, protecting us all from disease and safeguarding crops. Beavers help to store precious water in the dry desert. Elusive bobcats are a treat for anyone to see while out on a hike.

The pile of coyotes found near Santa Teresa is a grim reminder that a handful of New Mexicans think that wildlife is there for them to slaughter for fur or for a sport. But maybe, this horror will prompt some of our state legislators to act in 2021. A small fraction of our state’s population holds our public lands hostage for nearly a third of the year with dangerous and deadly traps. Banning traps on public lands must be a priority this coming year.

With newly elected representation in southern New Mexico, there will be an opportunity to make all of our public lands safer for people and pets and more hospitable to wildlife. Banning traps on public lands is a common-sense solution that our neighbors in Arizona and Colorado made decades ago. It’s time for New Mexico to catch up. In 2019, New Mexico passed Senate Bill 76 banning coyote killing contests. The obvious next step to bring our wildlife and public lands policies into the 21st century is right in front of us. Our elected lawmakers should have an easy decision in the upcoming 60-day legislative session.

As a rural resident myself, I see that these public lands are home to the most beautiful sceneries that southern New Mexico has to offer. These lands must not be home to dump sites and animals suffering and left to rot in the desert. Our elected lawmakers must recognize the change we need in order to ensure that this remains the Land of Enchantment.

To learn more about the effort to get cruel, indiscriminate traps off of public lands, please visit trapfreenm.org.

Read the Opinion in the Las Cruces Sun News »

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The New Mexico Game Commission approved trapping of bobcats, foxes, and other wildlife throughout the state on January 17. The decision reauthorizes the use of leghold traps, body-crushing traps, and strangulation snares that have killed and maimed endangered Mexican wolves and countless other animals.

The public submitted thousands of comments against the setting of traps, but these comments went ignored.

The Commission’s action makes it clear that it’s now up to the state legislature to respond to public concerns by passing “Roxy’s Law” (an anti-trapping bill named for a dog, Roxy, who died in a trap) in the 2021 legislative session. The bill ran out of time for a floor vote in the state House of Representatives last year.

Read the press release.

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Trap Free New Mexico is launching an online interactive map showing where trapping incidents have occurred. Red dots represent locations where dogs were caught in traps, blue dots show where illegal traps were set, yellow dots identify where Mexican gray wolves were caught, while green dots represent other incidents involving traps. (Courtesy Trap Free New Mexico)

Just in time for trapping season, a coalition calling itself Trap Free New Mexico is launching a new online interactive map that tracks incidences of illegal trapping and locations where dogs, Mexican gray wolves and even people have been caught in traps.

Chris Smith, Southern Rockies wildlife advocate for the environmental group WildEarth Guardians, said the map posted on the trapfreenm.org website is intended to raise awareness about trapping activities in New Mexico and the harm they can cause to domestic pets, wildlife and, sometimes, people.

“For us, it’s about three things,” he said. “Empowering New Mexicans who don’t know trapping is going on, is prevalent and a public safety hazard; it’s a tool for when you encounter a trap or your dog steps in a trap to report it so we can get a better scale of trapping activities, and while it doesn’t capture all the thousands of illegal trappings that take place, it shows the toll trapping has had on New Mexico as a whole.”

Read the article in the Albuquerque Journal »

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Many of us New Mexicans are – or know – people who “fair chase” hunt on our public lands. Our state Department of Game & Fish (DGF) rules give over 80,000 licensed hunters seasonal opportunities to shoot wildlife game by arrow or gun. Some hunt for food, some for a trophy, many to maintain a family tradition.

Soon, our state game commission, which oversees DGF, will vote on a very different set of public land hunting rules – the trapping of “fur bearers.” Existing DGF trapping rules are plagued with environmental, economic and ethical problems. Their victims: native wildlife, taxpayers, and the domesticated animals and humans that use public lands.

It’s time for change.

New Mexico has only a few thousand licensed trappers – 2,037 in the 2017-18 season. Their traps “harvested” over 5,100 “protected furbearers”; 85% were foxes and bobcats.

N.M. trappers pay $20 for a license, typically sell the fur pelts and pay no GRT on them. DGF rules let trappers “bag” – kill – an unlimited number of furbearers – “protected” or not. New Mexicans can also trap unprotected furbearers – e.g., coyotes – year-round without a license.

A trap indiscriminately catches any animal that steps into it – whether it be a fawn, critically endangered Mexican gray wolf, cougar cub, livestock or pet dog.

When the trap’s steel jaw, snare, cage, or leg/foot hold closes onto it, the animal can experience excruciating pain. It is always immobilized. Some animals try to escape by chewing their foot off. Most lie in misery for hours or days before the trapper or another predator comes by to finish them off.

Trapping is not “fair chase” hunting. It is barbaric and cruel. What’s more, the DGF policy that allows trappers to litter our public lands with hidden traps is dangerous – and very difficult and expensive to enforce. A recent example: DGF botching the criminal case against the trapper charged with 34 counts of illegal trapping and killing the pet dog that inspired ‘Roxy’s Law’.

It’s no wonder that 69% of New Mexico voters oppose the use of traps and snares. Yet now, DGF proposes a four-year plan that makes only cosmetic changes to New Mexico trapping rules.

This month our governor’s new game commission is accepting public comments before it votes on the new rules. How can we open their minds and hearts to change New Mexico trapping rules? Here are four things each of us can do now.

• Participate in the game commission’s upcoming evening meeting nearest you: Oct. 22 in Raton, Oct. 23 in Roswell, Oct. 24 in Las Cruces and Oct. 30 in Albuquerque.
• Send the commission your comments via email to the DGF at: dgf-furbearer-rules@state.nm.us and/or mail to: NM DGF, Attn: Furbearer Rule Development, P.O. Box 25112, Santa Fe, N.M. 87504.
• Learn more by reading the Albuquerque Journal’s Sept. 16 editorial.
• Share and sign Trap Free New Mexico’s petition.

Please act now so we can solve the problems with trapping in New Mexico.

Read the Guest Column in the Albuquerque Journal

The post Clock is ticking – stand up against trapping appeared first on TrapFree New Mexico.

Months later, a new governor with a strong mandate appointed a new Game Commission, giving hope to the 69% of New Mexicans who oppose trapping. There was a buzz of optimism among people who have had dogs caught in traps and snares. There was fresh opportunity for the thousands of activists who have spent years – even decades – trying to get these cruel devices off New Mexico’s public lands.

The Aug. 22 Game Commission meeting was a disturbing reality check.

Department staff again proposed a suite of insignificant changes to the trapping rules. The agency touted closing off some areas of the state that are “high recreation use areas.” The new closures total a minuscule 0.5% of public lands in New Mexico. The reality is that New Mexicans recreate all over the state and encounter traps wherever they go. Public lands from the northern mountains to the southern deserts are an amazing asset where New Mexicans of all stripes (and their four-legged friends) go to hike, camp, hunt, fish, bike, ride horses, run, or just enjoy the landscape. This is part of the dream of the American West. Traps are a nightmare.

No antidote was offered for the current “kill as many as you can” policy; there are no bag limits for native species like bobcats, foxes, badgers, beavers, muskrats, ringtails, coyotes or ermine. The department proposes continuing this unsustainable policy and is reliant on trappers’ estimations rather than science to justify it. The department’s assertion that bobcat populations are healthy rested partially on a graph titled “Trapper Opinion on Bobcat Population Trend.” There is little if any real scientific data on how bobcats and other species are faring in shrinking, hotter, drier habitats.

The department suggested increased setbacks from trailheads for trapping, but there is no data to suggest this will curtail trapping along trails themselves. Mandatory trapper education is proposed, but that’s a no-brainer that should have been implemented decades ago, not some great new cure-all.

Governor Lujan Grisham’s Game Commission members took the opportunity to express their enthusiasm for trapping. Commission Chair Joanna Prukop said that she had “overwhelmed the commission” with pro-trapping articles before the meeting. Commissioner Salazar-Henry inquired whether private trappers could engage in agency trapping efforts (like bighorn sheep recovery) and whether the department would consider opening now-closed wildlife management areas to trapping. Commissioner Jeremy Vesbach touted the paltry proposal as a “solution” that would allow trapping to continue, though he did softly bring up bag limits in the discussion.

Essentially, the Department and the Commission are attempting to tidy up the edges of a disaster and call it good. Near a few urban areas, they half-heartedly seek to prevent high-profile events that damage trapping’s image, while leaving the rest of the public and native wildlife in danger of falling victim to these cruel, indiscriminate devices. This tactic is analogous to leaving narrow strips of trees along roads to hide massive clearcuts in the watersheds of the Pacific Northwest. It’s little more than superficial.

In continuing the Martinez administration’s defense of trapping, this Game Commission – the Lujan Grisham commission – is acting against the interests of most New Mexicans, against native wildlife, against public lands, and against the governor’s mandate to bring our environmental policies into the 21st century.

New Mexicans overwhelmingly want traps off public lands. New Mexico needs to confront this cruelty. We deserve better.

Read the Guest Column in the Albuquerque Journal »

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California just became the first state in the country to ban fur trapping, solidifying its position as a trailblazer on wildlife issues. The Wildlife Protection Act of 2019, which Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law yesterday, bans commercial and recreational trapping animals for their fur on both public and private lands.

The move, which follows a 2015 ban on bobcat trapping, was celebrated by wildlife conservation and animal welfare groups that have been pushing legislators to update the state’s wildlife laws. As Brendan Cummings, conservation director with the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD), put it in a statement, the change “marks a milestone in the process of bringing California’s wildlife laws into the twenty-first century.”

“This momentous law, which was spearheaded by Assemblymember Lorena Gonzalez, will spare countless foxes, coyotes, beavers, and other wild animals from the unnecessary fur trade,” adds Camilla Fox, executive director of Project Coyote, an Earth Island project that promotes coexistence with wildlife. “For centuries, fur trapping has caused agonizing deaths for an untold number of animals.”

Read the article in the Earth Island Journal

The post California Just Became the First State to Ban Fur Trapping appeared first on TrapFree New Mexico.

The billboards feature a bobcat in a steel leg-hold trap with the message “Trapping is Torture: Protect Public Lands.” The billboards were deployed this month in an effort to mobilize popular support to support for a New Mexico legislative campaign to ban trapping on public lands.

It’s a message New Mexico’s citizens badly need to hear. Thousands of wildlife are killed every year in the Land of Enchantment due to the dangers of recreational and commercial trapping. There has been a number of high-profile incidents of dogs being injured or killed recently.

“As a dog lover, I was horrified by the recent story of a beloved dog strangled to death by a trap right in front of her desperate owner,” Dist. 43 Rep. Christine Chandler (D-Los Alamos). “I believe it is time to eliminate from public lands the indiscriminate and cruel devices on that can kill or severely injure pets and other collateral animals and encourage responsible and respectful hunting practices that do not cause such unnecessary suffering.”

Read the entire article in the Los Alamos Daily Post »

The post Reps. Chandler, Gonzales, McQueen Co-Sponsoring Bill to Protect Native Wildlife and Companion Animals appeared first on TrapFree New Mexico.