Something about this story from Canada reminds me of that old joke of the young farmer deciding to broaden his hopes by adding chickens to his investments. He goes to the feed store and asks for 50 baby chicks, tucks the box under his arm and walks away. A week later he is back again, asking for 100 chicks. Again he takes the purchase carefully away and disappears. The third week he comes back asking for 200 chicks! The feed store owner can’t help but comment and says ‘wow you’re really liking this chicken career!”
The farmer shakes his head, “It’s not working out at all.” He laments.
“I must be planting them too deep!”
Death of beavers accidental, says Parks Canada
JOE LOFARO /METRO OTTAWA
A Parks Canada official says two beavers that built a lodge near a wharf at the Hogs Back locks were accidentally killed when rising water levels drowned them inside a live trap.
He said Parks Canada hired a licensed trapper with the Ministry of Natural Resources who is experienced with trapping beavers in urban areas.
Area resident Jenni Meldrum claimed she saw kill-traps at the site when she walked her dog on Tuesday, but Mazurkiewicz said that is not true.
“It was not a snare trap,” said Mazurkiewicz.
“Because of the warm weather and the way the beavers had put the branches and so on around their beaver lodge, water built up and they were drowned.”
So beavers built up their lodge because of the warm weather? (Um, that doesn’t make sense. Beavers build up their ‘lodge’ for cold weather.) Can we just assume he means ‘dam’ and doesn’t actually know the difference? And can we assume that any person that hires an ‘executioner’ as a ‘birthing coach’ probably doesn’t care too much about outcome?
Let’s give trappy the benefit of the doubt and say he DID use Hancock or Bailey traps. Any trap that kills is a ‘kill trap’ essentially. That is why a person might visit his trap the next morning. Or why a responsible human wouldn’t use a live trap at all during rain or snow melt because it would be dishonest to say the animals can be safely trapped when they’re going to be flooded before you get around to freeing them.
“We try to be as humane as possible with the trapping, and it’s unfortunate that the beavers died,” said Mazurkiewicz.
Hand me a Kleenex! Your heartfelt regret is gonna make me cry! Is it just me or are you SICK of these people who apologize without admitting they ever did anything wrong in the first place? ‘If I hurt you I’m sorry’. ‘If you misunderstood my intentions I apologize’. “If the beavers drowned its unfortunate.”
PULEEZE!!! Spare us the faux-regret. You wanted these beavers OUT of the way and spent a little extra money asking for live traps so huggers like Ms. Meldrum and her friends at the PTA wouldn’t make your little ‘parks-&-rec‘ kinda life any more miserable than it already is. You knew the water levels were likely to change. You knew relocating beaver in January was a death sentence. You knew that Timmy the trapper would probably kill them anyway. You just wanted them gone.
Just so you know, the dead beaver in that trap could have been somebody’s prize poodle – lets say the wealthy matron in charge of gift baskets for your Christmas parties – you could be in a hundred gallons more hot water than you are now. Think about that the next time you decide not to inconvenience your residents with the horrific burden of explaining how to wire wrap their precious trees.
