Wolf trapping
If you reside in Montana, PLEASE SUPPORT I-177
Despite tens of thousands of public comments against wolf trapping, Montana allowed wolf trapping to protect elk even though the elk population had increased by 47 percent since the wolf reintroduction.
Now, there are 29,000 too many elk. The massive overpopulation of elk creates fertile ground to spread brucellosis and chronic wasting disease, threatening cattle and other wildlife. Montana now has fewer than 500 wolves. There are too few wolves to range statewide and take out the weak and sick.
But wolf trapping continues. For a handful of wolf trappers’ pleasure the state risks so much?
Last year more than 33 mountain lions were killed in wolf traps. Hound hunters often see mountain lions missing toes and feet. A multitude of animals including a grizzly, eagles, other rare and sensitive species and our dogs have been maimed, tortured and killed in wolf traps.
Defenders of trapping call it “a time-honored tradition,” but the reality is a brutal, non-selective slaughter of our wildlife for recreation and profit. Market hunting was outlawed a century ago in this country. How is it that trapping to sell pelts still exists? A $29 trap license allows an unlimited number of traps to indiscriminately kill a limitless number of publicly owned wildlife and throw away the carcasses.
This is not management; it’s wanton waste.
Wildlife watching brings Montana $500 million annually. In a record high year, 2012, trapping brought $2.7 million. That is 5.4 thousandth of one percent of wildlife watching revenue. Yet our public lands are silent, empty of furbearers. So people throng into trap-free national parks hoping to glimpse Montana’s precious, dwindling species like the fisher, lynx and wolverine.
As I write this, traps are causing unspeakable atrocities on the living.
Trapping is wrong, any way you look at it.
Support Montana Trap-Free Public Lands I-177.
Constance J. Poten
Missoula