Eliminate coyote snaring

We are in the midst of yet another coyote snaring season and a segment of Maine’s wildlife is being persecuted while an intense debate is being prepared for this legislative session in an attempt to end this practice. I believe the snaring program should be eliminated for the following reasons.

. The cost: The Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife is spending $67,981 a year on coyote control; $20,000 for direct expenses such as payment to snarers; $26,891 for coyote-related activities; $21,000 by the Maine Warden Service for monitoring and enforcement services. There are also hidden costs not reflected in these figures like time spent on the issue by management personnel. In a time of a billion-dollar shortfall, this money could be better spent. Some IF&W biologists would like to see it go into the program to improve wintering habitat which would do far more to help deer, in the long run, than killing coyotes.

. The science: a) There is scientific evidence that coyotes, when threatened with hunting pressure, will more than compensate for the losses to their population due to the following: Young coyotes, which are capable of producing larger litters, will disperse into an area where older established adults have been removed. Additionally, pup survival rates go way up because there is less adult competition for food when large numbers of adults are eliminated from a given territory. What may actually be happening is that this program is creating more coyotes, not less. b) In the long term, to eliminate a natural predator from Maine’s woods is actually going to do more harm than good to the deer herd by further upsetting the predator-prey relationship. It is a known fact that large predators keep herds healthy by culling the weak and sick. In central and southern Maine, where the coyote populations are relatively undisturbed, the deer herd is thriving and many areas have far more than their carrying capacities allow.

. The ethics: a) It is now known that snaring kills in unimaginably cruel ways; that some of the animals have lingered for days in insufferable pain only to be clubbed or shot to death by the trapper. In my opinion, any such treatment of Maine’s wildlife or any living creature, for that matter, is unethical and should be halted immediately. Coyotes are, for better or for worse, Maine wildlife and should be afforded humane treatment. b) Is it ethical to manage (kill) one species (coyotes) for the benefit of another species (deer)? The deer in northern Maine are on the northern edge of their range and are low in numbers mainly due to habitat degradation. The deer herd in central and southern Maine has exploded to an estimated population of more than 240,000 animals because of habitat changes due to sprawl and past (mis)management practices. Do we really need to make more deer in northern and Down East Maine?

. Nontargets and endangered species: U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler recently ordered the USFWS to examine their reasons for listing the lynx only as threatened, and not as endangered, as well as the service not making our northeast Canada lynx a distinct population segment and designating critical habitat for lynx in the Northeast. We have a growing population of lynx here, an animal in dire need of protection in the United States, yet snarers are allowed access to lynx areas in the state. In the past, snares have killed lynx, bald eagles, moose, bobcat, fox, fisher, and, ironically, even deer, the animal that is supposed to be protected by them.

. Public relations nightmare: People from all over the state, the country and the world have written to the governor and the commissioner decrying the snaring program. Many have stated that they will not spend their vacation in Maine because of it. Contrary to what some lobbyists would like us to believe, the people who oppose snaring are not animal rights nuts but come from all walks of Maine life. They include hunters, trappers, legislators, writers, artists, ethicists, some of the state’s own wildlife biologists, doctors, lawyers and newspaper editors from the state’s best newspapers, including your own; a far cry from the lunatic fringe.

The snaring program was established in 1985 by Commissioner Glen Manuel. The Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine and the Maine Trappers Association have strongly lobbied for it ever since. I am of the opinion that a vast majority of people in Maine are against this cruel and archaic practice. Maine’s wildlife “belongs” to all of Maine’s citizens, not just the few who, though very vocal, are in the vast minority. I want to emphasize this is not a hunting issue, it is about a costly, scientifically unsound, and cruel system of killing wildlife.

Bob Brooks is a resident of Montville.