Encourage USFWS to Take Cruel Traps out of Its Toolkit on National Refuges
Dear John,
Our national wildlife refuges are intended to be truly special places: protected havens where wildlife can thrive and we can enjoy beautiful natural landscapes. Recently, the US Fish and Wildlife Service proposed a rule that would add crucial wildlife protections to refuges by limiting lethal management of predators. Under the proposal, predators on refuge lands could be killed only as a last resort, a significant improvement on current practices.
However, the proposal should go further by banning the use of body-gripping traps altogether as a predator management tool on refuge lands. These traps, which include leghold traps, body-crushing traps like Conibears, and neck snares, are immensely cruel and indiscriminate. No wild animal, pet, or human should have to fear stepping into a brutal body-gripping trap on a national wildlife refuge. As the USFWS makes other positive changes to its wildlife management practices, it should incorporate this long-overdue prohibition on such archaic devices.
|
What You Can Do
No later than Monday, March 4, please submit a comment to the USFWS expressing support for the proposed rule and urging inclusion of a ban on body-gripping traps as a predator control method on national refuges. Please be sure to share our action alert with family, friends, and co-workers, and encourage them to take action, too. As always, thank you very much for your help! Sincerely,
Kate Dylewsky Assistant Director Government Affairs Program
P.S. Follow us on Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), and Instagram for other important animal protection actions and news. Check out the latest edition of the AWI Quarterly!
Photo by Jerry Kirkhart
|