• Jan 10, 2021

• https://www.reformer.com/opinion/letters/letter-time-to-ban-trapping-in-vermont/article_a6245b24-5104-11eb-b13d-77605c7c8e7e.html

Editor of the Reformer:

If you think the kind of senseless violence we saw at the capitol on Wednesday (Jan. 6) does not happen here in Vermont, you are wrong. It does happen here. It’s just that the victims of this violence have hardly any advocates on their behalf.

Trapping of wild animals is legal in Vermont and licensed by the Fish and Wildlife Department. Trapping is completely different from hunting. While Vermont hunters traditionally hunt by the rules of clean kills and fair chase, trapping does neither. Leg-hold traps are not designed to kill, but forcefully and painfully immobilize their victims for hours or even days until a trapper shows up to dispatch the animal, usually by clubbing it to death. Underwater traps, such as are used for beaver and muskrat, kill animals by drowning them — which take at least 20 minutes to accomplish…