Dear Editor:
I read your paper of Oct.18th. with the Misleading / Untrue head line “ Animal Cruelty Is Legal In Vermont” and Protect Our Wildlife knows it but it does get misinformed people fired up. This weeks paper has seven letters praising your paper and Protect Our Wildlife for bring the issue to the public .
What I did notice was some statements are assumptions or regurgitation of tails put out by the anti-trapping groups. One being traps can be placed anywhere, on public (get it public) land yes a trapper can place traps wherever he/she pleases its public land and we have just as much right to use it as anybody else.
On private land the trapper most have permission to be there, by the way if the land is Posted “No Hunting , Fishing , Or Trespassing” you are not allowed to walk your dog on it either. I have permission to hunt and trap on a couple of properties that are legally posted and every year I meet somebody out walking their dog and I ask them if they have permission to be their and the answer I get is will I’m just walking my dog. So, I ask is it my fault if their dog gets caught in one of my traps or is it the fault of the Trespasser?
The statement that animals have been know to be left trapped for a week or longer, I have heard this claim for the last forty plus years that I have been trapping. Trappers are required to check their land sets once every day, failure to do so is a violation and would result in the lost of the individuals license.
One person mentioned finding a bloody foot while walking her dog, and of course it had to be a trapper that was responsible, an assumption without any proof. Could it be possible that some predator killed and ate all but that foot?
I believe every person has the right to his or her opinion but it is also the obligation of that person to do their home work and research the topic they are commenting about it and not to blindly take the word of just one side of the issue. Protect Our Wildlife’s goal is to end all trapping so I would expect they would have a slanted view of the practice. Trappers want to keep on trapping in accordance to the regulations and they in turn would have a slanted point of view but at least you would have heard both sides of the issue. By the way Trappers are the most regulated group of sportsmen in the State of Vermont, maybe reading the Vermont Hunting & Trapping Guide would give some insight to what is required to be a Trapper in Vermont.
Sincerely,
Bill Pickens