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Poll Reveals New Mexicans Believe Trapping
Contacts: Mary Katherine Ray, Rio Grande Sierra Club volunteer wildlife co-chair- Barbara Coulter, APNM's Wildlife Campaigns Manager Camilla Fox, Director of Wildlife Programs, Animal Protection Institute
November 14, 2005, New Mexico - New Mexicans are opposed to the practice of trapping on public lands within the state, according to a poll released today. The results of the poll come on the heels of two recent disturbing trapping incidents in New Mexico that followed the opening of the trapping season on October 15. The first incident occurred in October, when an El Dorado-area coyote had to be euthanized after carrying an unregistered steel leg-hold trap on her front leg for several weeks. After capture by Santa Fe Animal Control, damage to the coyote’s leg was deemed severe enough that veterinarians at the Espanola-based Wildlife Center amputated her leg. They later were forced to euthanize the animal in light of her poor chances of surviving in the wild on just three legs. The second incident occurred outside Silver City on November 8th, where a registered nurse and her dog were both injured by unregistered steel leg-hold traps on public lands. The nurse was walking in the Gila National Forest when the dog’s leg was clamped in a steel leg-hold trap. While trying to free her companion animal, a second leg-hold trap sprung shut on her own foot. "I was wearing sandals at the time, and luckily was able to pull back quickly so the trap only grazed my toes, drawing some blood, before it clamped onto the end of my sandal,” she said. “I can't believe we allow these cruel and torturous devices on our public lands this day and age, I feel it really reflects poorly on New Mexico,” she added. Badly shaken, she sent a letter to Governor Richardson in the hopes of raising awareness about the danger of trapping on public lands. According to Winston resident Mary Katherine Ray, a retired schoolteacher and volunteer for the Rio Grande Chapter of the Sierra Club, situations such as these are all too common under New Mexico’s extremely liberal trapping regulations. “There are no bag limits, no limits to the number of traps set out, and very little oversight of cruel and indiscriminate trapping in New Mexico,” said Ray. After her own alarming personal experience with her own dogs and a steel leg-hold trap on a public hiking trail near Winston, Ray began looking into trapping in New Mexico, which ultimately led her to organize a poll on New Mexicans’ knowledge and attitudes about trapping.
The results of the poll, released here publicly for the first time, reveal a strong majority of New Mexicans (63%) would like trapping prohibited on New Mexico’s public lands. “What’s especially notable is that across the board, all groups of New Mexicans favored prohibiting trapping on public lands— men, women, rural, urban, Republicans, Democrats, hunters, backpackers, companion animal owners— everyone,” noted Ray. When asked why they believed trapping should be prohibited on public lands, the majority of New Mexicans responded that trapping was “cruel.” Significantly, nearly six in ten New Mexicans polled did not even know that trapping was occurring on public lands in the state. But once they were told of trapping practices, respondents strongly supported prohibiting trapping on New Mexico’s public lands. “Apparently, trapping is New Mexico’s dirty little wildlife secret,” said Ray. “According to New Mexico Game & Fish numbers, more than 18,000 animals were killed by body-gripping traps in New Mexico last year— and that doesn’t include cougars, mule deer, companion dogs and cats, and other non-target animals,” said Barbara Coulter, Wildlife Campaigns Manager for Animal Protection of New Mexico, which along with the Rio Grande chapter of the Sierra Club and the Animal Protection Institute helped underwrite the survey of New Mexicans. But Coulter points out that even those numbers are just an estimate, because trappers in New Mexico are not required to report the wildlife they have killed. “In fact, trappers have an incentive not to record the number of animals they’ve killed, so they can avoid being taxed on the income of pelt sales,” added Coulter. “The bottom line is that we have no way of knowing how many of New Mexico’s animals spend their last days struggling with a mashed limb in a trap, before finally being beaten, strangled, or shot to death.” “Leghold traps, snares, and body-crushing Conibear traps are landmines for wildlife,” said Camilla Fox, Director of Wildlife Programs for the Animal Protection Institute, which has been involved in campaigns to restrict trapping throughout the nation. “No animal is safe when these indiscriminate devices are used on public lands.” “Any animal can trigger one of these deadly traps, including threatened and endangered species, family companion animals, and even people,” said Fox. Records obtained from state and federal wildlife agencies by the Animal Protection Institute (API) show that bald eagles, lynx, wolves, and other species listed under the Endangered Species Act have been injured and killed in body-gripping traps. API maintains an online database of incidental captures of non-target animals: http://www.bancrueltraps.com/b_trapping_incidents.php Mary Katherine Ray is hoping the poll will encourage New Mexicans to have an honest discussion about the practice of trapping, and demand that state wildlife management be guided by their views and the best science available.
For more information on trapping in New Mexico, visit the Rio Grande chapter of the Sierra Club at: http://www.riogrande.sierraclub.org/%5Ctrapping%5Cindex.htm For national trapping information, visit Animal Protection Institute at: http://www.bancrueltraps.com/ If you wish to share your experiences with traps on public lands, visit www.apnm.org/trapping
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