Nevada Department of Wildlife (NDOW) requests trappers fill out and return a questionnaire providing data on animals and birds trapped whether the individual was targeted by the trapper or not. The wording indicates that compliance is optional: “NDOW appreciates your participation. . . ” To make participation easier, the agency sends each licensed trapper a postage-paid, addressed envelope.
Comment: This appears absurd. Perhaps from experience a trapper can leave his deadly device where he thinks the desired species will show up. But he cannot be sure. Obviously he has no control over what species will be caught.
Is it clear to trappers that Nevada Administrative Code requires a response?
Language of the Regulation: NAC 503.160
“Failure to return the form or questionnaire within [the period designated annually by the Nevada Board of Wildlife Commissioners] or the submission of any false information on the form or questionnaire is cause for the Commission or the Department to suspend the trapping license held by the person and deny the person the right to acquire any trapping license for a period of 1 year.” Is this regulation enforced?
To find an answer about enforcement, we refer to NDOW reports on trapper numbers from 2015 and 2016 which are the most recent we could obtain. So far requests for more current data have not been fulfilled. It appears the average compliance is 19%.
In 2015 from a total of 1334 licensed trappers, only 223 (17%) handed in their end of season reports.
For 2016 we do not have the total number of trappers, but only 58 individual trappers completed their reports.
Data from NDOW Furbearer Harvest Questionnaires 2002-2013
Animals
Species
Number
ReleasedUnharmed
ReleasedInjured
Dead
Rabbits
4190
191
400
3145
Dogs
195
163
14
16
Cats
116
33
7
28
Mountain Lions
172
135
8
17
Other
183
15
5
153
Livestock
25
15
3
5
Game
33
20
3
4
Badger
1
0
0
1
Bear
2
2
0
0
Bobcat
1
1
0
0
Chipmunk
5
0
0
6
Ermine
1
0
0
1
Feral Pig
1
0
0
0
GroundSquirrel
11
1
1
9
Pack Rat
193
0
0
191
Pond Turtle
5
5
0
0
Skunk
4
1
0
3
Total
5138
582
441
3579
Bird species reported trapped:
Golden Eagle, Hawks, Owl, Blue Heron, Chukar, Coot, Ducks, Geese, Magpie, Quail, Rail, Raven
Really? Somebody can crush this guy in a trap and sell his pelt?
Charlotte McConaghy’s book Once There were Wolves (Flatiron Publishers—2021) has been coloring my mind ever since I read it. In her novel the Australian writer imagines re-wilding the wolf population in Scotland. The book deals with domestic violence as well as violence towards wolves, horses, the earth itself. The drum beat of rapidly accelerating climate change provides the pacing for this rarely comfortable but often lyrical read.
As Inti Flynn, the novel’s central character, points out, “…the physiological response to witnessing someone’s pain is a cringe, a recoil, a wince. We are hardwired for empathy. Once upon a time I took delight in feeling what others felt. Now the constant stream of sensory information exhausts me…I can’t get lost in the wolves or I won’t survive.”
Flynn, who has been sent to Scotland to lead a team of biologists reintroducing wolves to an area of the Scottish Highlands, is affected by the violence she sees on all fronts. She is able to relate the cruelty to the wolves to the cruelty her own sister faces in a dysfunctional relationship. One can only imagine how that empathetic character would react to scrolling through the news reports of fighting in the Ukraine.
Another major theme of the novel is the thorniness of communicating when generation-held opinions clash. One poignant passage has the main character sharing a recording of wolves howling in such a way that the person she is trying to convince to listen actually does listen and begins to share her passion for wolves. As she points out, they are animals who have in their power the means to restore a degraded environment and make it sustainable again.
This book does not devastate—which is more than I can expect from tomorrow’s news—but it does present questions that are very real in our world: Will the wolves survive? Will the women? Will violence or measured communication have the upper hand?
Annoula Wylderich has been an animal advocate since 2008, campaigning for ALL animals. She is the founder of the Vegas-based grassroots organization, Animal Protection Affiliates. She has been Senior District Leader for HSUS, State Director for Animal Wellness Action, and board member of the NSPCA. She has been recognized for her advocacy by both the HSUS and PETA Here she adroitly sums up what’s wrong with trapping.
One would assume that if you are going to end the life of an animal, for whatever reason, that you would do it mercifully. Even hunters have certain ethics which they follow, if they pursue their activities with any integrity.
However, trapping seems to be in a category all its own and among the cruelest of sportsmen activities. It constitutes a small percentage of the hunting population (thankfully), but renders so much suffering, that over 120 countries have banned or curtailed trapping. That sends a significant message to the rest of the world, which the U.S. would be wise to note.
Traps cause unimaginable suffering to both intended and unintended victims, including endangered species and pets. They have resulted in orphaned cubs and pups, in animals suffering prolonged deaths or maiming, and in animals experiencing pain, fear, hunger, thirst, exposure and attacks by predators as they lie helpless and unable to defend themselves. While it’s incomprehensible that their torture could last the typical 36 hours that most jurisdictions stipulate for trap-check time, Nevada still permits a 96-hour timeframe – IF trappers even abide by this regulation. We have no way of knowing and requests for any significant data on trapping in our state have produced disappointing results.
This is an outdated, archaic activity that needs to be re-visited by our leaders if we truly value our ecosystem and the proliferation of eco tourists to our state. Those tourists are not paying to have their safety compromised nor to come across animals in various stages of suffering. It’s time, Nevada. For anyone who may be interested in updates or opportunities to help advance more compassion in trapping, please contact me at wylderich@cox.net
Credit: Wyoming Untrapped
Concerned residents can also contact the Governor’s office to express their opposition to trapping. In Southern Nevada, call: 702-486-2500; in Carson City, call: 775-684-5670. Let him know you consider trapping devices to be cruel to animals and unsafe for the public and our pets and that you wish to see them banned.
Lately Nevada wildlife watchers seek solutions to so many issues: Wildlife killing contests; lack of representation on local or state wildlife boards; hunting black bears; hunting with hounds; persecution of predators. In the mix is the outcry against cruel trapping. With no apologies, this newsletter will keep up the fight for an end to commercial and “recreational” trapping on our public lands.
To most wildlife watchers, trapping is arguably the most abhorrent, repulsive, ethically bankrupt torment that can be visited upon animals.
From Time To End a Twisted Tradition by Jim Robertson: “Unless a severe blow to the head or some psychopathic disorder has rendered them incapable of feeling empathy for others, anyone who witnesses the harrowing ordeal suffered by an animal caught in a leghold trap should be appalled and outraged that trapping is still legal in a society that considers itself civilized. The continuation of this horrid, outdated practice in a country governed by the people suggests that either most folks have brain damage, or they are simply unaware of the terrible anguish and desperation a trapped animal goes through.”
The cruelty argument is frequently dismissed as “unscientific” Thousands of people who write to TrailSafe and to similar groups around the USA, are not concerned with being “scientific” and object to trapping because of its extreme cruelty. Are they all wrong? Is trapping harmless recreation like birdwatching? (As one member of the Washoe County Advisory Board to Manage Wildlife declared to the media) Did over 100 countries worldwide ban or severely restrict trapping for any other reason? Why do all the major animal advocacy groups in the USA call for an end to commercial trapping? Or, better yet, all trapping.
The cruelty argument is the elephant in the living room in any discussion of trapping.
Society presumably advances through time. Cruelty to pets is increasingly penalized. Cooney’s Law, SB223 passed in the 2011 Nevada Legislature, makes heinous cruelty to pets a felony. Yet the agony inflicted on trapped animals is still legal. Why does a dog have more protection than a coyote?
Credit: Trapfree New Mexico
Nevada does not require any courses or training to get a trapping license, whereas, if you were born after Jan. 1, 1960, you need to provide proof of hunter education to purchase a Nevada hunting license. A trapping license is required to: take furbearers by any legal method, take unprotected mammals by trapping, or sell raw furs for profit. $42.00. Persons 15 years of age and under pay only $14.00. That’s it. You pay the fee and you have a trapping license.
Hunter Education Online Study Guide
For the benefit of prospective hunters, Nevada Department of Wildlife (NDOW) provides an online study guide. And thrown in, a trapping code of ethics for anybody who wants to trap, regardless of age. This section needs a 21st Century overhaul, fact check and debunking.
The Study Guideintroduction: “Trapping furbearing animals was once a full-time occupation. Today, regulated trapping is an important tool for managing our nation’s natural resources”.
Demythification:
Trapping is not resource management. Trapping is indiscriminate. Trappers conduct no surveys to determine species populations. There is no upward limit on numbers of animals Nevada permits trappers to kill.
Study Guide Trapper’s Code of Ethics:
1. Obtain the landowner’s permission.
Beowulf
This was hardly the case when traps showed up on the Sturgis family ranch. The family dog, Beowulf, was trapped and injured. In efforts to free him, Judy Sturgis suffered hand injuries which required stitches and also a bite from the panic-stricken animal. Later trespassers denied the traps were theirs. Nevada Department of Wildlife (NDOW) game warden and the police were of limited help. The entire story was published in the January 15, 2014 Minden Record Courier. https://trailsafe.org/beowulf-trapped-on-his-own-ranch-three-trespassers-deny-involvement/
2. Avoid setting traps in areas where domestic animals may be caught.
Domestic animals are caught in a variety of settings including residential neighborhoods, hiking trails and equestrian trails. NDOW lists of non-target animals trapped are obtained from trappers’ self-reports. Here is the astonishing variety of species:
3.Set traps to capture the target animal in the most humane way possible.
There is no humane way to set leghold, snare or Conibear-type traps.
4. Check traps at least once every 24 hours, preferably in the early morning.
We spent a year 2013-14 testifying to the Wildlife Commission making the case for daily trap inspection. But Nevada statute gives trappers 96 hours, i.e. four days, to let animals suffer unspeakable pain, fear, thirst, hunger, exposure to predators, exposure to elements. With only 31 law enforcement officers to cover 110,567 vast, mostly empty, square miles, enforcement is chancy at best. So many animals probably suffer even longer. 33 states have 24-hour visitation law. This includes large Western states such as CO,AZ,NM,WA which are comparable in size to Nevada. And, each of these states have placed limits or bans upon public lands trapping. Again, Nevada lags way behind.
5. Record trap locations accurately.
Maybe trappers do this for themselves . Their traplines can be miles long, so a reminder would be helpful. As for telling the public where their beloved pet might be likely to have body parts mauled or broken and scream out in pain and terror, well that’s a joke to trappers. When we asked for trap markers, we met derision. What if somebody would steal a precious trap? Traps cost between $5 and $20. What if a tree hugging bandit messes with one? The public now has the right to move or disable a trap that poses risk, thanks to our successful bill, SB364. But this fine point of ethics remains a joke to trappers.
6. Identify all traps with waterproof name and address tags.
When our campaign began, traps had no ID, no way to hold trappers accountable. It took ten years of legislative wrangling, finally we succeeded in 2017. Every trap, snare or similar device used in commercial and/or recreational trapping on public land has to have eitherthe trapper’s name and address, or else a registration number issued by NDOW.
7. Use as much of the animal as possible before disposing of remains.
8. Dispose of animal carcasses properly so as not to offend others.
We try to spare you the worst photos, so be forewarned if you follow this link from our colleagues at Trapfree New Mexico: https://trapfreenm.org/carcass-pile-dumped-trapper/ Evidently some New Mexico trappers don’t mind offending others. We suspect it’s the same in Nevada, but don’t have photos.
9. Make an effort to trap in areas with a surplus of animals.
This data is not readily available. Most wildlife watchers do not believe that animal populations need to be controlled by lethal means. Wildlife find the balance when living according to Nature’s plan in their habitat. We have not seen any data to indicate “areas with surplus of animals”.
10. Promptly report the presence of diseased animals to wildlife authorities.
At a 2014 Wildlife Commission meeting, trappers discussed creating a course similar to the hunter ed course. To date, there is no official course. Trappers are well organized: they are a presence at sportsmens’ meetings and social events, and are effective lobbyists. No question they are supportive of each other. That’s how they’ve gained so much influence in our state.
12. Know and follow all trapping regulations.
NDOW has a system of penalties and demerits for violations. With traplines covering miles, with traps so well camouflaged, it’s no easy task to enforce regulations. We are currently seeking data on numbers of violators.
13. Support enforcement of all regulations
The most basic regulations had to be established when we entered the arena in 2007. At that time trappers believed they didn’t need any identification or registration on traps; that they could trap in residential neighborhoods; that any ignorant soul daring to touch one of their traps owed a $100 fine; and that no wildlife advocates deserved a seat on the trapping committee. They believed the only possible objection to trapping was when one’s dog was trapped. Humane arguments were shrugged off. Whether trappers “support enforcement of all regulations” is dubious in the extreme. We have to be on guard because any regulations we managed to push through can be overturned in future Legislative sessions.
14. Dispatch trapped furbearers in a humane manner.
There are those who think shooting or drowning or strangling or beating a helpless animal while it’s trapped and has spent at least four days in terror and pain is humane. Those should never be in a position to make decisions about the wildlife that by law belongs to all the citizens of this state.
“Dispatch” So the trapper can get $7.76 for a pelt.
The Study Guide provides a Glossary which defines one word: “Dispatch”: “To put to death quickly” Be aware of other euphemisms for cold-blooded, heartless, grotesque killing: “harvest”; “take”; “cull”
A hero is born among a hundred, a wise man is found among a thousand, but an accomplished one might not be found even among a hundred thousand men – Plato
Wayne Pacelle refers to Cleveland Amory as “the founding father of the modern animal protection movement.”
Here is an introduction to the accomplished man and his many accomplishments. Wildlife watchers everywhere are in his debt. His book Man Kind? Our Incredible War on Wildlife, was published in 1974; is out of print, but used copies can be ordered online. It is more than worth the price for a copy that may be yellowing and brittle, but with content as vital and probably more entertaining, than anything available today. In the video below, Amory blasts the wildlife “management” establishment as we all have done over the years either in the media, or behind the scenes, as we experience year after year frustration, roadblocks, opposition, apathy, myths, outright lies, ignorance from those we once naively thought were interested in protecting, propagating and restoring our native wildlife. Amory delivered this tirade in 1974. That was 48 years ago. We’ve moved forward a bit here and there. But almost everything Amory says is just as true today. What are we going to do about it? How do we honor his legacy?- By Trish Swain, Editor Nevada Wildlife Watcher
Man Kind? Our Incredible War on Wildlife
“My book is a thorough and convincing argument that game management as practiced today in the United States of America is a cruel fraud.” Amory believes the country “will survive the privation” if NRA “just goes”. “State laws against cruelty to animals must be applied to wild animals… and they must be upheld by the courts” [I, your humble editor, have expressed this concept for years! But we have yet to see any action upon it. Action by me or anybody else.] Echoing many of us, Amory goes on to say “State Fish and Game Departments must be reconstituted so that their numbers represent non-hunters.” “Game management must get out of the game . . . “
The Fund for Animals
The Fund for Animals was founded in 1967 by author and animal advocate Cleveland Amory, and spearheaded significant events in the history of the animal protection movement. Among its historical work, the organization implemented a massive four-year airlift to rescue burros scheduled to be shot by the National Park Service in the Grand Canyon; launched a three-year rescue of burros in Death Valley National Park; rescued 3,000 goats from San Clemente Naval Weapons Facility; and halted some hunting seasons of wolves, bison and bears across the U.S. In 1979, the Fund for Animals purchased land in Texas to build Black Beauty Ranch, now a 1,400-acre sanctuary for nearly 800 animals—40 different species—rescued from cruelty and neglect, including tigers, bears, primates, burros and horses. – HSUS
Black Beauty Ranch
. . . Inspired by Anna Sewell’s novel Black Beauty, Amory established the Black Beauty Ranch, a 1,460-acre sanctuary that sheltered various abused animals including chimpanzees, burros and elephants. Located in Murchison, Texas, this ranch accommodated over 600 resident animals. Amory’s goal was to “create a sanctuary where its inhabitants would roam unfettered and unbothered by human taskmasters.” The words on the ranch’s gate are taken from the final lines of Sewell’s novel, “I have nothing to fear, / and my story ends. / My troubles are all over, / and I am at home.” The ranch is currently operated by Humane Society of the United States.
Compleat Cat
Cleveland Amory and Polar Bear
“You cannot expect everything even from the friendliest cat. It is still a cat.”
“Cats have enormous patience with the limitations of the human mind. They realize…that we have an infuriating inability to understand, let alone follow, even the simplest and most explicit of directions.”
“Unlike some people who have experienced the loss of an animal, I did not believe, even for a moment, that I would never get another. I did know full well that there were just too many animals out there in need of homes for me to take what I have always regarded as the self-indulgent road of saying the heartbreak of the loss of an animal was too much ever to want to go through with it again. To me, such an admission brought up the far more powerful admission that all the wonderful times you had with your animal were not worth the unhappiness at the end.”
The Compleat Cat includes three books – each volume an international bestseller upon publication. The three are consecutive – the history of Amory’s relationship with adopted stray, Polar Bear. In fact, the books are as much autobiographical as they are a tribute to their relationship. Amory weaves in sidelights from a life few if any of us could hope to match. Amory has drinks with Cary Grant at the Hollywood Polo Lounge; enlists Princess Grace of Monaco, Doris Day, Mary Tyler Moore, and other luminaries as sponsors of his Fund for Animals; buys the first Sea Shepherd for Captain Paul Watson and goes on mission to Canada’s Magdalene Islands to protect baby seals from being clubbed to death by the fur trade. And that’s not all – just a sampling. In fact, Polar Bear becomes a celebrity with heaps of fan mail, but he “did not like anything about being a celebrity. For one thing, celebrities have to meet a great many new people, and Polar Bear did not like new people. . . He had already met everyone he wanted to meet, and in fact he would have dearly liked to subtract some of these.”
Trapping
Amory devotes 116 pages of Man Kind? to trapping under the title: “Real People Wear Fake Furs” This provides a wealth of trapping and anti-trapping history. The story is richly detailed, taking us from colonial days to the National Anti-Steel Trap League, to the Friends of the Earth to the Fund for Animals to pushback from groups like The Fur Conservation Institute of America and Fur Age Weekly and so many others. Many of the stories here are unbearable to read, but Amory did not flinch from the blood-soaked truth. Will it take another 50 years for the world to see an end to the despicable practice of trapping?
“I consider the leghold trap the most devilish instrument ever inflicted by the hand of man on a fellow creature”
“I have read book after book about the early days of the fur industry and hardly one of them mentions anything about the death of the animals, let alone what kind of death.”
Sea Shepherd
In 1978, Amory purchased the first oceangoing vessel for Captain Paul Watson, the founder of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. Watson says: “I needed a ship and there was only one person who I could turn to for help. That was Cleveland Amory, the founder of the Fund for Animals. I approached Cleveland with an idea and he said, “Go and get your ship” and handed me $120,000 in cash.
“With that money, I located an old British trawler in October 1978 named the Westella and renamed her “Sea Shepherd.”
Without Cleveland, I could not have done it. He was my friend and mentor until his death in 1998.”
The Sea ShepherdIn 1993, Sea Shepherd named a ship in Cleveland Amory’s honor
Author,Journalist, Editor, TV Commentator, Critic
“Cleveland Amory meanwhile became one of the most subversive elements ever to mock the status quo from a social position securely inside the establishment.” – Merritt Clifton
1939 – 41 youngest editor ever hired by Saturday Evening Post
military intelligence US Army1941-43
1952 regular columnist for Saturday Review
1952 hired as commentator on NBC’s Today
1963-76 Critic for TV Guide
inspired CBS documentary on hunting: “The Guns of Autumn”
Daily radio essay “Curmudgeon at Large”
Syndicated column “Animail”
1980-98 contributing editor Parade magazine
Only film appearance: Mr. Danforth in comedy-drama “Mr.North”
All books are nonfiction, unless noted otherwise.
The Proper Bostonians (1947)
Home Town (1947) (novel)
The Last Resorts (1952)
Who Killed Society? (1960)
Celebrity Register (1963) (with Earl Blackwell)
Man Kind? Our Incredible War on Wildlife (1974)
Animail (1976) (collection of Amory’s syndicated columns)
The Trouble With Nowadays: A Curmudgeon Strikes Back (1979) (fictional satire)
The Cat Who Came for Christmas (1987)
The Cat and the Curmudgeon (1990) (alternate title: The Cat Who Stayed for Christmas)
The Best Cat Ever (1993)
Cleveland Amory’s Compleat Cat (1995) (all three “Cat” titles in one volume)
Ranch of Dreams (1997)
Vanity Fair, A Cavalcade of the 1920s and 1930s (ed. with Frederic Bradlee)
“I’m just a long-time wildlife advocate, now convinced that our wildlife management system is badly in need of reform so that trapping abuses can be curtailed. Wildlife management needs to be more democratic and friendly to all wildlife. The wildlife commission’s ‘war on predators’ needs to stop.
“I have several long-standing concerns about mountain lion management in Nevada.”
About 1975, one of the two Reno newspapers ran a front-page story about a man who killed a mountain lion on Mount Rose. A photo was included, showing the dead lion draped sideways over the hood of the car with the beer-bellied hunter standing in front. The caption said (if memory serves) that there were only 39 mountain lions remaining in Nevada.
The photo and story alarmed me. I checked to see where I could go to express my concern about this story. I found out that the Nevada Department of Fish and Game was the state agency charged with wildlife management in Nevada. Coincidentally, the Nevada Fish and Game Commission was meeting in Reno soon after the story appeared.
I found the agency, appeared at the front desk, and asked for the location of the commission meeting. I was escorted into a small room with maybe a dozen men sitting round a table.
After momentarily interrupting their meeting, I was asked my name and the reason for my visit. I showed them the photo I’d clipped from the paper and expressed my concern…. nay, my outrage at the story. I was quickly advised by the agency director that the story was wrong. He said there were 750 mountain lions in Nevada.
After expressing relief at that news, I inquired as to the source of that number. I was told a mountain lion hunter told them so!
The agency had hired a mountain lion hunter living in Northern Nevada to advise it about Nevada’s lion population. The lion hunter, a convicted poacher, knew of about 30 lions living along the Sierra Front which he regularly chased with his dogs.
He then sat down with topographic maps of the entire state, looked at elevation contours, and marked an X at every spot he thought a lion might be living. Adding all the X markings to the 30 lions he already knew about……presto! An answer.
Nevada has 750 mountain lions. Who knew???
When I heard that account, it alarmed me as much as the original story in the newspaper. Is this the way wildlife is managed in Nevada? Is the Fox truly in charge of the Henhouse??
That event started me on my path of wildlife advocacy in Nevada, now some 45 years in duration.
Parenthetically, over the years since then, the mountain lion population in Nevada, estimated by the Nevada Department of Wildlife, has varied from 350 up to 5000!
The last estimate, produced for a wildlife commission meeting in 2014, was about 1400 animals.
Currently, the department makes no estimate of the lion population.
