Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumTwo Banff National Park wolf packs likely decimated by trappers. Warning, GRAPHIC!!!!!!!!!
In January, Craig Comstock did what hes done many times over the years loaded his two dogs into his vehicle and drove from his home in Calgary to the backcountry for a day hike.
Comstock, 44, is an avid outdoorsman he hikes, fishes and hunts pheasants and partridges but none of that prepared him for what he found in the bush.
First, he came across two dead foxes and a dead wolf.
Their heads had been cut off, their feet had been cut off and they had been skinned, he told The Narwhal, noting that he also saw several piles of bait meat.
Then, as he walked on, he felt the prickly sensation of being watched. His eyes met those of a wolf, just 10 metres away. It was huge, he said much, much bigger than his own dogs.
He froze.
Then he noticed that the wolf was trapped in a wire snare. Comstack and the wolf stared at each other.
I wish there was something I can do to help, Comstack remembers thinking.
I cant cut you loose, buddy, he thought.
The wolf lay back down in the snow.
Comstock would find six other dead wolves caught on the same trapline.
When John Marriott, a local wildlife photographer and conservationist in Canmore, Alta., first heard word about the live wolf found in a snare, he set out to check the traplines himself.
What he found, he says, was a scene of carnage. He told The Narwhal he found three dead wolves, nine dead coyotes and four dead foxes all of which had been skinned.
All, he says, were just laying there with the meat in various stages of decomposition.
https://thenarwhal.ca/two-banff-national-park-wolf-packs-likely-decimated-by-trapping/?fbclid=IwAR0M8PKUa-ZzAuaMkjajTyLOA9syDU0sdX89JSFcGgN81-Vfg_afNotgCGc
Duppers
(28,127 posts)With enough investigators on this, they could find the monsters who did this. They are somewhere selling these pelts right now. Some billionaire's huge mountain lodge will be decorated with wolves' skins and heads.
Just googled and found that you can find a find a Rocky Mountain Bearskin on Esty for just $80.
How are these people so devoid of empathy for anything other than themselves.
I hate people.
defacto7
(13,485 posts)It's getting harder to find the empaths for all the psychopaths.
Duppers
(28,127 posts)Bayard
(22,157 posts)Of course, not too many people hike with a catch stick. Hoping the guy in the article at least called a ranger.
Duppers
(28,127 posts)And you and I would hike out to get help.
There's another video showing how another guy took a big, tall/wide piece of plywood to protect himself from an attack, placed it between himself and the wolf. He put it on top of the wolf's foot and opened the trap to release the wolf.
I'd post it but the guy was the one setting the traps for .....coyotes!! Not wolves. Thankfully, he respected the wolf enough to release it.
I know coyotes are becoming a problem but I cannot endorse trapping as a remedy. Must not use poison either. Suggestions?
(Yep, I left the guy a comment.)
Duppers
(28,127 posts)Bayard
(22,157 posts)I've loved wolves since I was a kid. This makes me so sick.
I don't guess there's any way to determine who is buying the pelts?
From the article:
"It is imperative that we do not let radical animal-rights extremists ruin the image of such a beneficial practice, it states."
Proud "extremist" here. And proud, card-carrying member of "Defenders of Wildlife".