Dogs and Traps: Safety Rules Proposed
By Jennifer Landes
(06/07/2007) To help prevent dogs from being caught and killed in animal traps, the New York State Department of Conservation last week proposed new regulations on body-gripping traps larger than five inches.
Under the proposal, traps of that size would have to be arranged one of three ways: first, to be set five feet above ground; second, placed inside a container with restricted openings and other features that would keep a dog from entering or triggering the trap; or, third, set within a container fastened to a tree vertically, raised only six inches from the ground, with the opening at the base.
According to Sara Davison, the executive director of the Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons, four dogs lost their lives in upstate New York last year because of body-gripping traps, and a dog named Zephyr was killed the year before in the Long Pond Greenbelt in Bridgehampton. Zephyr’s death led to laws banning the traps on town-owned property in Southampton in March of last year and in East Hampton in December. The East Hampton ban does not affect land held by the East Hampton Town Trustees.
The D.E.C. shaped the new rules in consultation with trappers. The traps most dangerous to dogs are those used for raccoons and fisher, a mink or weasel-like woodland animal. Both creatures, trapped primarily for their fur, are smaller than most dogs and accustomed to climbing and foraging for food and seeking shelter by crawling into narrow holes.
Ms. Davison, who was a proponent of the local laws, said the proposals were a step in the right direction. “Anything’s better than what we have now.”
Ms. Davison would like the department to consider banning the practice altogether. She wondered if the needs of 12,000 registered trappers in the state and the fewer than 200 on Long Island should be weighed against the “millions of us with dogs,” who fear going to parks where they might see “a squirrel or their own dog thrashing around in a trap.”
“Recreational trapping is a thing of the past,” Ms. Davidson contended. She wondered how it could be appropriate that the needs of “200 antiquated hobbyists be considered at the expense of having wildlife, pets, and even children put in danger?”
Lori O’Connell, a spokeswoman for the D.E.C., said that applications for trapping licenses, at about 12,700 statewide, have actually been increasing, albeit slowly, over the past few years. She also confirmed that the deaths of four dogs that had been caught in traps were reported to the department last year.
The guidelines were published in the weekly New York State Register on May 30 and are subject to a 45-day written-comment period ending on July 16. Ms. O’Connell said the proposal had already received a great deal of feedback and that there was a mixed response and strong feelings. The department will take its time to “analyze what people are saying in both the trapping industry and the public.”
Gail Murphy, who was the owner of Zephyr, was one of those critical of the proposal. She would prefer that there be a “place for trappers to go and a place for people to go without trappers. . . . Do you want to see dead, dangling animals one foot off a hiking trail?”
Ms. Murphy also recommended that in areas dedicated to trapping, it would be mandatory for signs to be posted and dogs to be leashed.
The D.E.C.’s previous guidelines recommended that traps not be set where a dog might come across them. According to Ms. O’Connell, signs to alert hikers that trapping is allowed in an area, or signs indicating where it had been banned, could be considered in the future. She added that such signage is not subject to the regulatory process and could be implemented any time.