According to the Animal Alliance of Canada, our Nation’s Capital is one cruel place indeed – when it comes to beavers anyway.
In a media release, the animal rights group pleads with Mayor Jim Watson that the City can no longer keep “crushing, strangling, gassing, poisoning and shooting wildlife.”
If you click on the link, you’re led into the group’s website and what I would refer to as the ‘back story’ on this issue – a letter from Donna DuBreuil of the Ottawa-Carleton Wildlife Centre regarding a family of beavers in Stittsville.
In Ms. DuBreuil’s letter entitled; Ottawa’s Shame…a Death Sentence for the Stittsville Beavers, she recounts the story of a mother beaver and her kits removed from Paul Lindsay Park and relocated to a new area.
In the letter, Ms DuBreuil notes that a relocation of this nature would likely mean death to one beaver family…(I mean Lily and her kits, sorry)
Ottawa, the most wildlife unfriendly City in Canada?
Is it me or has the Animal Alliance of Canada totally lost their mind??
I know it may sound like cruel and unusual punishment but in the real world the only logical & ethical way to manage a beaver population is through trapping, which is exactly what should have happened in this situation. (But I do understand that trapping is not always a viable option within City limits.)
We Conservationists are not being heartless or mean, and it may come as a shock to many but there are actually more beaver in North America today than when Pioneers first arrived at this country! Reason being: their population is no longer trapped to manageable levels.
But calling Ottawa a ‘Wildlife Unfriendly City’ after they went through the effort of relocating a family of beavers instead of trapping them, is the most preposterous thing I have ever heard!
By the way, I have some raccoons at my place that need relocating…
Outdoorsguy
Well if she wants the skunk that sprayed the backdoor siding of our house a few weeks ago, she welcome to have it, and all of the ones in the neighborhood. I will even give her the raccoons that visit our place. Want a few roaming cats from our neighborhood, heck there are so many, many not from household (wild).
Let her deal with them, and then see how she copes.
just totally ridiculous, these are anti hunting, anti trapping, anti anything that has to do with managing an over population of animals. They think that the land animals live on is owned by the animals, and should be given back to the animals, unless of course these animals happen to set up on their property, then of course it’s “different”
This group of clowns have run into a lot of problems with the MNR for moving wild skunks and other rabies carrying species around, most of these people at the OCWC are over the edge
May I point out a few facts to Ms. DuBreuil and anyone foolish enough to believe her. If the beavers had been left where they were in Stittsville they would have died over the winter.
The pond they were in is an overflow drainage pond in a residential area. The only trees available for the beavers were in peoples back yards. Would you appreciate trees felled across your lawn, breaking your fence or landing on your car? What about the kids play structures?
The pond was not deep; it would have frozen to the bottom during a cold snap. The beavers either would have been trapped under that ice or had to relocate in the middle of the winter (Ms. DuBreuil’s bath tub would have been my recommendation).
The beavers were live trapped and transported to the Ottawa River to be released where they would have an excellent chance of finding suitable accommodations, food, and not been a danger to residential property. The beavers were relocated in plenty of time to collect the necessary stores to survive winter in a natural environment, not in people’s back yards.
But Ms. DuBreuil does not care about beavers really she is just there to push her misguided dangerous to wildlife agenda!
While I was not personally involved with this effort to save these beavers I applaud those that were. It would have been easier and much more cost effective to just trap and kill these beavers!
Rick makes some great points. I’m not at all surprised that any animal activist group would take an inch and stretch it out as far as possible.
Anyone who believes those beavers should have been left in that pond are absolutely clueless about nature – it was not a natural living space for any animal.
Or sure, leave them there so they can consume all the food and water from an unnatural source. I’m sure that place was perfectly clean for a beaver.
morons.
Jeff , i work for the city and was privy to some additional info about this ridiculous story from this group , to say the least it was an enormous waste of taxpayer money (no fault of the city) the city has a hired trapper to get rid of problem wildlife and from what i heard he was doing a fine job until people showed up picketing in beaver costumes as well as destroying his traps… its a shame what the world is coming to these days .As im typing this post im anxiously awaiting the season premiere of duck dynasty but with only one problem ….. has anyone else noticed they dont even hunt on the show anymore !!! no doubt this is due to fears of being cancelled or censored by some tree hugging animal rights lover …
Guys,
The thing about these groups that makes my hair stand on end is that their arguments are completely based on emotion and not on any kind of mature logic. Jeff’s article above is just another example. The reason why the country is going down the tubes is that people are actually being influenced by them. Case in point – the Global TV fiasco. I used to laugh this stuff off but it’s getting to the point where we hear this kind of garbage all the time. I’m not normally a person who likes to post on message boards but the way it’s been lately, I figure it’s time to get involved and join others to oppose this tide of propaganda.
Quote
Rick Poulin says:
October 10, 2012 at 2:05 pm
May I point out a few facts to Ms. DuBreuil
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don’t let facts or common sense sway your judgement
these people have mental issues
and yet we listen to them
we let them upset us
really, we should ignore them, and so should our city
we should pity them
I sincerely hope that the so called “Animal Alliance of Canada” doesn’t get any funding from the provincial or federal governments.
Speaking of relocating nuisance animals….
I read an article in the local paper last night about a small buck attacking a girl waiting for the school bus. Apparently after her mom saved her and got her on the bus, the deer then chased another kid on a bike down the road, with the mother keeping the car between the deer and the kid till the deer gave up.
Not sure what got into this deer but every effort should be taken to ‘relocate’ it from it’s rura home to someplace ‘safer’… I know a cool climate where I would have relocated this deer had this happened at my place.
I try to do my part to keep our school children safe….!
The problem is now being dealt with in Toronto. My son lives there, and in his neighbourhood (west end), he hears .22 rifles going off every night before garbage pick up day. People are arming themselves and shooting the racoons in their backyards, or trapping and drowning them, then disposing of the evidence. Shoot, shovel and shut up. Everyone knows what is going on, and are keeping quiet. Raccoons are now 4 per acre, across Toronto, but the empty headed animal lover freaks don’t care about the damage these vermin do to humans. Garbage bags are picked up every day with the remains a 20 pound raccoons, the collectors know it, the workers at the dump see them, the brass at city hall know about it, but have accepted it as a good compromise.
PS.: It’s happening here, too.
Today’s Outdoors Column, in case you couldn’t find it:
http://www.ottawasun.com/2012/10/10/deer-out-in-full-force-in-fall-on-rural-roads
Outdoorsguy
Hides for the homeless. That would be my solution. I know it would work in the Yukon but we are not exempt from the anti attitude here either. What had to be done 100 yrs ago to survive is now looked at as wrong by too many meat eaters. I never heard of a tainted moose scandal. After coyote attacks are the norm in the city limits the wolves and bears will line up for free grub.
Yukon Bob, that is a terrific idea..and I only wish it would work around here. It is a popular concept south of the border, however tends to get caught-up in public opinion up here in God’s county..
Speaking of God’s country, are you still chasing those Yukon moose..or is that long over now???
Outdoorsguy
we have a serious coon problem here in Ottawa too but our local government just sticks it’s head in the sand, they are afraid to upset anyone
good column Jeff
Iggy I know the facts are lost on the antis but the other side of the story needs to be told. There are readers who if they only get the story as provided by the likes of Ms. DuBreui believe her lies and propaganda! They need to know how dangerous this woman really is to the animals she professes to love and protect.
Rick…there are scads of people out there willing to sell you a variety of different snake oil, but it’s up to us as educated and informed citizens to be smart and do our homework. As many have pointed out, emotion tends to cloud common sense in a lot of cases.
Just because we are educated and experienced in the way of the wild, and tend to be logical where common sense is placed ahead of emotion, doesn’t make us cruel and uncaring…as the ‘Hunting Companion’ post proves..
But whatever, people believe whatever they choose to believe…just like the fellow yesterday who assumed I wrote my deer-vehicle collision column, as a way of encouraging urbanites to preserve more deer for me to shoot…hehe..too much man! Oh well..thank goodness Keebler jumped in!
Outdoorsguy
Here is one for the anti hunters…… i have eaten meat every day this week and have yet to look for a code that tells me it may be recalled by piss poor meat inspectors…. but then again my meat is inspected by me and me alone when i clean it and cut it up myself and freeze it…. NO CODE REQUIRED
good for you Chess..now, hopefully you can include some of nature’s most perfect meat this weekend on your moose hunt!!
Outdoorsguy
quote Chessy
chessy says:
October 12, 2012 at 11:50 am
Here is one for the anti hunters…… i have eaten meat every day this week and have yet to look for a code that tells me it may be recalled by piss poor meat inspectors…. but then again my meat is inspected by me and me alone when i clean it and cut it up myself and freeze it…. NO CODE REQUIRED
Amen to that! and now I have my own in the freezer after harvesting my first calf on Thanksgiving day October 8th at 10:00 am NO code required other than a legal licence to harvest :o) and to boot shortly after the shot the cow was being “romanced” by a bull to further the cycle. I hope that the cow wasn’t playing hard to get ]… LOL!
Alain, congrats on the moose! I bet that’ll be yummy….mmmm, I can almost taste it now!!
My Dad is back from his very first moose crossbow hunt(at age of 81) and they didn’t connect this time…managed to push a nice bull off to another gang that took him at a scant distance of 25 feet…oh well.
Outdoorsguy
Things are gearing-up in the Great Outdoors!!
http://blogs.canoe.ca/outdoorsguy/hunting/big-game-hunters-bragging-board-2/
Outdoorsguy
hi jeff i was on my way home to almonte last night after work and saw a moron try to pass a vehicle lucky he didn’t as 2 massive bucks and 4 does were crossing the road he would have certainly wrote off his little smart crap car people don’t use good judgement anymore until they meet wildlife crossing a road he did however have a leafs sticker on his car . tell all of the tree huggers to move to L.A.
mike jones, that is very lucky for those deer and the driver too. Sometimes we don’t realize how close we are to a major accident…and everything can change in a flash. Remember those poor folks on the QC-side with that bear hit on the highway?
You heading out for deer this fall, mike?
Outdoorsguy
For such an animal unfriendly city we do have lots of wildlife!
I live just of Greenbank Rd. in Barrhaven in a very busy residential area. The last two days two turkeys have been feeding just off the payment near the fire station. Then last night at 11:15 as I lay in bed the coyotes started howling. I do not know how many there were but it was more than two.
Rick, what are you still doing up at 11:15?? Man, get some sleep will you…lots of hunting coming up!!
Outdoorsguy