Lethal control Archives - TrapFree New Mexico

Farming is possible without killing coyotes

TrapFree New Mexico — Mon, 29 Mar 2021 16:49:40 +0000

BY MICHELLE LUTE, PhD

As a scientist advocating for evidence-based decision-making, I’m doing everything I can to promote Roxy’s Law, Senate Bill 32, to ban public lands trapping, snaring and poisoning in New Mexico.

In my testimony and prior opinion pieces, I address the science and value-based systems that inform debate on these lethal tools. While those points seem to resonate with some, recent debate from legislators centers not on science but on the traditions of farming and ranching.

So never mind science for a moment. I’d like to talk about traps, snares and poisons wearing my farmer hat. I am the daughter of three generations of farmers. I think three generations is enough time to inform useful thoughts on land stewardship.

My great-grandfather, grandfather, father, their wives, children and hired help never had to employ a trap, snare or poison in their livelihood of raising livestock and crops. We had more issues with deer in fields or rodents in grain bins than coyotes even looking at our cows or horses. Coyotes were welcomed because they checked rodent populations and were fun to watch.

During state Senate floor debate, Sen. Cliff Pirtle portrayed vulnerable images of cute baby cows. I agree, they sure are cute, as are baby pigs, chickens, horses and all the young ‘uns of the pastoral lot. Those same baby cows Pirtle so vividly depicted are some of my fondest childhood memories. But Pirtle also vividly described gory scenes of predation by wild canids. Well, nothing like that happened on my family’s farm (farming can be gory thanks to humans).

We weren’t spared those gory scenes of nature red in tooth and claw because we were lucky in some way. We didn’t experience conflict with nature because we understood nature and practiced commonsense husbandry. In nature, babies are vulnerable. So calves (and colts, fillies, piglets) were welcomed into the world close to human presence and shelters. We lost fewer mothers to birthing complications that way.

We also avoided conflict with nature by not asking for conflict in the form of lethal control. This is where I must put my science hat back on and point out that studies increasingly support my family’s experience. Lethal control begets chaos in the social dynamics of coyotes and other predators. It can also increase the chances that breeding adults get killed before they teach their young to properly hunt. If you’re not taught how to get healthy food, you end up at the easiest fast-food joint. Similarly, juveniles that aren’t taught to hunt native prey might turn to an atypical food source like an easier (future) burger, however cute it may be.

I understand my family’s operation isn’t that of our state’s current ranchers. I sympathize with drought conditions making it hard to graze on manageable acreage. I understand vagaries of beef prices and globalization creating competitive markets in Brazil. It’s hard to keep up and make a living. But no leg-hold trap is going to fix it.

Let’s talk about helping ranchers and farmers make a living and steward our Land of Enchantment with forward-thinking policies. Let’s address the challenges of drought, climate change, pandemics and globalization. But let’s not confuse ourselves into thinking we can trap, snare and poison our way into a better future.

Michelle Lute is the National Carnivore Conservation Manager of Project Coyote, holds a doctorate in wildlife management and lives in Santa Fe.

Read this article in the Santa Fe New Mexican »

The post Farming is possible without killing coyotes appeared first on TrapFree New Mexico.

NM game panel puts black bears at risk

TrapFree New Mexico — Mon, 23 Dec 2019 22:03:41 +0000

By Jan Hayes, Founder, Sandia Mountain Bear Watch

Courtesy BearWatch A BearWatch member who lives in the Manzano Mountains puts out a childs wading pool in the summers, and bears including this mother bear come to drink and bathe.

The New Mexico Department of Game and Fish has recently released its Final Adopted Bear Rule for the next five years, 2020-24, and the news is not good for New Mexico’s bears or for those of us who had hoped for some reasonable conservation for this species.

BearWatch did its homework to provide input for the rule-making by analyzing past harvest statistics: the number of bears killed by hunters per year, ages of harvested female and male bears, hunter success rates, and a multitude of other pertinent facts.

BearWatch met with six of Gov. Lujan Grisham’s new game commissioners for two-hour meetings held at their convenience in different locations in the state. We met to express our concern about the past eight years of the department’s mismanagement in regard to the over-harvest of New Mexico’s bears, especially female bears, and to suggest remedies that could be incorporated into the new Bear Rule.

The yearly statewide harvest limits have been so high – 804 total; 40% or 318 females – that they were never reached, which meant that there were no limits or management in place. Unfortunately, the commissioners chose to disregard biological science and harvest stats, and made no change to the faux “limits.”

BearWatch’s research showed an alarming statistic: the average age of killed female bears, sows, is now 6.5 years, or at the threshold of a red-line age 6 recognized by BearWatch’s bear biologist experts for maintaining the population. Since New Mexico’s sows don’t have their first cub until around 5.7 years old and reproduce only every two years afterward, if the average killed sow is less than approximately 6 years old, the population cannot reproduce itself. This is a major concern and is being ignored by the commission in the new Bear Rule with the statewide annual sow harvest limit set at an outrageous 318, triple what it should be.

As BearWatch predicted, when hunt limits were doubled during the past eight years, you have a declining bear population, with hunters unable to find male bears, so they irresponsibly kill female bears – 2019 showed only a 10% hunter success rate. Female bears are the future reproducers and better management should be in place to protect them.

We also reported to the commissioners that for the past two years, when mother bears were killed by cars, etc., and there were surviving cubs, those cubs were being destroyed by Game and Fish officers or being released too young on their own to starve or be predated upon by other wildlife. In the past, with the department’s help, Dr. (Kathleen) Ramsay’s bear cub rehabilitation foundation took care of as many as 30 cubs some summers. Game and Fish officers took no cubs to Ramsay this summer and only one last year. BearWatch finds this new practice unethical and callous.

Commissioners did change one rule for the next four years. They were concerned about the heat in the southern part of the state for bear hunters and their hounds, so they extended their hunt into late November and December. Of course, late-winter hunting is unfair to a bear since they are in torpor, an almost drugged state, and not up to a hound pursuit. Denned females with cubs can be disturbed, abandon their cubs and be killed. This makes for an unfair and unethical hunt. Commissioners were aware of this, but chose to give the hound-hunters their late November-December hunt, anyway.

Bears are the most intelligent wild species in North America. They are omnivores, with 90% of their diet consisting of vegetable matter. Unlike the grizzly, they are not considered to be an aggressive animal. The black bear is the logo of the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish. I often ask myself why New Mexico’s bears are treated with such disdain by the Game and Fish Department and this Game Commission.

It takes courage and leadership to reject bad advice that is being foisted on you by the same people who have mismanaged this species for the past eight years. Unfortunately, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s newly appointed commissioners were not up to that task and New Mexico’s black bear population is at risk because of them.

Read this Guest Column in the Albuquerque Journal

The post NM game panel puts black bears at risk appeared first on TrapFree New Mexico.

Predator Control Should Not be a Shot in the Dark

admin — Fri, 14 Oct 2016 22:01:12 +0000

Livestock owners traditionally use various non-lethal and lethal methods to protect their domestic animals from wild predators. However, many of these methods are implemented without first considering experimental evidence of their effectiveness in mitigating predation-related threats or avoiding ecological degradation. To inform future policy and research on predators, we systematically evaluated evidence for interventions against carnivore (canid, felid, and ursid) predation on livestock in North American and European farms. We also reviewed a selection of tests from other continents to help assess the global generality of our findings. Twelve published tests – representing five non-lethal methods and 7 lethal methods – met the accepted standard of scientific inference (random assignment or quasi-experimental case-control) without bias in sampling, treatment, measurement, or reporting. Of those twelve, prevention of livestock predation was demonstrated in six tests (four non-lethal and two lethal), whereas counterintuitive increases in predation were shown in two tests (zero non-lethal and two lethal); the remaining four (one non-lethal and three lethal) showed no effect on predation. Only two non-lethal methods (one associated with livestockguarding dogs and the other with a visual deterrent termed “fladry”) assigned treatments randomly, provided reliable inference, and demonstrated preventive effects. We recommend that policy makers suspend predator control efforts that lack evidence for functional effectiveness and that scientists focus on stringent standards of evidence in tests of predator control.

Read the peer-reviwed research paper

The post Predator Control Should Not be a Shot in the Dark appeared first on TrapFree New Mexico.

Research Review Finds that Weak Science has Bolstered the U.S. Government’s Predator-Control Practices

admin — Fri, 14 Oct 2016 21:51:59 +0000

From their review of the prevailing research into lethal and non-lethal predator control practices in North America and Europe, an international trio of environmental scientists has determined that the science behind the reviewed research is not very scientific. In fact, the authors of the review- titled “Predator Control Should Not be a Shot in the Dark”- call for a moratorium on lethal predator control policies until researchers adopt higher testing standards. The new findings are being hailed by wildlife conservation groups like Project Coyote, which have questioned traditional predator management policies and practices as carried out by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services program.

Read the blog post from Project Coyote

The post Research Review Finds that Weak Science has Bolstered the U.S. Government’s Predator-Control Practices appeared first on TrapFree New Mexico.

The Case for Mass Slaughter of Predators Just Got Weaker

admin — Fri, 14 Oct 2016 21:47:51 +0000

A new study finds little evidence that lethal predator control does anything to help ranchers.

A new study published in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment found that there’s little scientific evidence that killing predators actually accomplishes the goal of protecting livestock.

The study reviewed previous research attempting to measure the effectiveness of various predator-control methods in North America and Europe. Some studies looked at whether killing predators meant fewer livestock deaths, while others examined the success of nonlethal deterrents, such as the use of guard dogs and flag-lined ropes or wires.

The study found that most of the research doesn’t hold up scientifically. Only two of the studies were deemed top notch because they took into consideration the possible effects of things like disease, weather and other elements that could influence livestock deaths. But neither study focused on the effectiveness of killing predators. Instead the papers concluded that certain nonlethal predator-control methods helped ward off future attacks on livestock.

“People deserve to hear the options and understand the evidence, especially if our government claims to be science-based in our policies.

The new study shows there’s not enough science to support the killing of these animals. “Any government action that destroys wildlife should be scrutinized to a higher level.”

A move away from killing predators would require a culture shift among ranchers, who often jump to lethal predator control because it offers a quick and easy fix with short-term results. “People are instant gratification creatures,” he explains. “A lot of ranchers are very comfortable with that model.”

Read the article from National Geographic.

The post The Case for Mass Slaughter of Predators Just Got Weaker appeared first on TrapFree New Mexico.