RR#1 Lindsay
Ontario K9V 4R1
705-374-4834
/ Andrew Shearer
114 Sunnywood Rd.
RR#5 Lindsay
Ont. K9V 4R5
1-705-799-1518
To The Honorable Minister Linda Jeffrey
Minister Of Natural Resources, Ontario
Whitney Block
6th Floor Rm 6630
99 Wellesley St W
TorontoONM7A1W3
I am writing to you on behalf of The Ontario Sporting Dog Association, we are the largest sporting dog assoc in Canada, it has been brought to our attention that there is a snaring program going to take place in the Brockville area of Ontario this year and that it is going to run for the whole year, this is very disturbing to say the least to our members. We were aware that the OFA had made a presentation to MNR, to reintroduce snaring in southern Ontario. The OFA program would allow farmers to set snares on their property. We think that this is a step backwards and that the problem facing the farming community and indeed MNR can be managed in a much simpler way.
1/ The real reason for the explosion in the coyote population in Ontario is dead stock left in the fields and bush to rot. The coyotes are eating these carcasses all winter.
2/ Composting does not work covering carcasses with six inches of sawdust or straw isabsolutely a waste of time as the coyotes eat them anyway.
3/ Burying animals has been proven to be a waste of time as coyotes will dig down as much as eight feet to get to a carcass and consume it under ground. OMAFRA has already done a tenyear study and that was, their findings
4/ I do not blame the farmer for this as they have already taken a large loss when their animal died and as the dead stock people are charging up to $275.00 to take cows away you can see their reason for dumping them in the woods.
The biggestreasons for the explosion of coyotes in Ontario arewithout a doubt the availability of food. The coyotes are eating on the dead stock piles all winter. Then in February Whenthe females get bread and start looking for a place to have their pups. She will dig a den close to her food source; ie. piles of dead stock. Now you must understand that, these carcasses are frozen solid during the winter and will staypartially frozen well into the spring. When she has her pups sixty four days later she has a source of highprotein food, for the whole time that her pups are at the vulnerable stage, to predators. By the time the flies take care of the carcasses her pups are at the stage that she is now mobile to move them to fresh carcasses. This is the reason so many coyote pups are surviving and why the population has exploded.
These piles of carcasses are causing many other changes in the habits of the coyotes in Ontario, these animals are smart and have learned to co-exist with each other in a way they would never have done thirty years ago and I believe this is because theylearned to tolerate each other at the dead stock piles and have learned to live in groups and hunt together as well.
The answer to this is not rocket science, reduce the amount of food available to the coyotes and you will reduce the coyote population.
1/ The government needs to immediately reintroduce the subsidies for the removal of dead stock or institute a program that removes all dead stock for free for the farmers.
2/ Removing the food sources for the coyotes and will reduce the amount of coyotes that make it through their first year.
3/ The removal of all dead stock will also make it easier for trappers to remove nuisancecoyotes that are causing problems as they will be more susceptible to bait at a traps.
4/ All dead stock should be recycled there is one plant in Listowell that is making everything from bio-fuel, hydro to methane gas to fertilizer from dead stock. They power all there fleet of trucks and still have bio-fuel for sale. This plant is capableof handling in excessof five hundred animals a day and these plants should be encouraged to increase their volume.
5/ The only other answer to this is to make it legal for farmers to burn dead stock and this should be done within twenty four hours of the animal dying.
I personally have hunted and trappednuisancecoyotes for almost thirty years and realize that the farming community is having a serious problem right now but snaring is not the answer to this.
I have been involved with the Lindsay district trapper’s council for many years and our council has discussed this subject many times and every time we have passed motions not to support snaring in southern Ontario. I have enclosed two letters from our council one that was sent to The Honorable John Snowbelen in January 7, 1999 the last time they tried to introduce snaring and a letter from our secretary Mr. Dave Simser dated July 2, 2009 this was brought up at Lindsay district’s meeting and they still do not want to support snaring. The chance of some ones dog getting caught in snares is too great and the publicity that would come from it would be terrible. If a person walking on one of the many un-assumed roads in Ontario was to get their dog caught in a snare it would be all over the front page of the Toronto Star and the Sun and the publicity from this would affect not just snaring but all trapping in Ontario. Please note there is no such thing as a non-lethal snare if the snare is set in a fence the animal simply jumps over he fence and hangs it’s self and if it is set in the woods the same thing happens if the animal jumps over a low hanging branch, I personally lost three dogs to illegal snares in the area where I live and the thought of snares being legal in this area is very disturbing to me as a dog owner and a trapper.
We would like to request a meeting with you and your staff on this matter as soon as is possible.
Yours Truly
John Bell President OSDA