Despite years of cross-fostering genetically valuable lobo pups from captive litters into wild wolf dens, scientists have determined that the overall genetic diversity of the wild wolf population has declined each year for the last four years.

The Mexican wolf was nearly eradicated before recovery efforts were begun. The genes of only seven wolves founded the entire Mexican wolf population alive today. It is a limited genome from which to draw, but the captive population still has 37% more genetic diversity than the wild one, which means more can be done. Cross-fostering is not enough.

The US Fish and Wildlife Service must stop removing wolves from the wild. In the last six months, the agency has fatally shot two wolves, captured and removed four members of another pack and killed the fifth member in the den. A kill order for an eighth wolf is in effect at this writing. These actions are taken at the behest of livestock interests.

The Rio Grande Chapter joined 29 other conservation organizations urging that these removals stop.

It is also becoming increasingly clear that a genetic infusion from the Northern gray wolf that is being restored to Colorado will be needed. For this to happen, the Mexican wolf must be allowed to naturally migrate north beyond the arbitrary boundary of Interstate 40. Some members of the NM Game Commission seemed open to allowing this at the August meeting in Catron County.

Releasing well-bonded captive wolves with their pups is also a proven way to get genetically important wolves on the ground quickly. In very welcome news, Asha, the wolf who twice wandered north of I-40 only to be captured and placed into captivity where she chose a mate with whom she produced pups this spring, has been returned to the wild with her entire family. They were released onto the Ladder Ranch in Southern New Mexico.

The pack has been named the Quartz pack, and while the pups are not yet collared, the approximate locations of Asha and her mate can be viewed on a map provided to the public by the US Fish and Wildlife Service.

You can see her location on this map. Please note the locations are not precise. The hexagons are 2000 acres in size, and they are not in real time.
https://www.arcgis.com/apps/mapviewer/index.html?webmap=dbcc9960867948aea225fc53c50d0ed0

FEATURED IMAGE “ASHA” WITH PUP, U.S. FISH & WILDLIFE

This spring marks the 11th year of wolf pup cross-fostering. Seventeen Mexican wolf pups were transferred from captive dens into wild dens to increase the wild population’s genetic diversity.

Now the agency has released good news about the wolf Asha. She famously twice roamed north beyond the arbitrary I-40 boundary. First, she almost got to Colorado and, after being captured and located south again, she journeyed north a second time to the Valles Caldera. Then she was placed into captivity with a captive born male wolf named Arcadia.

They mated last year, but no pups were forthcoming. This spring, the two have had a litter of five. Once the pups are old enough for their vaccinations, the US Fish and Wildlife Service promises the whole family is going to be released. They are currently in an acclimation pen on the Ladder Ranch. When ready, the agency will open the gates to let them run free on Ladder Ranch land which has agreed to accept them. Hopefully with a family, Asha will stay home. She never preyed on livestock on her travels and successfully avoided humans. She can teach her mate and pups to do the same.

Unfortunately, another wandering wolf named Ella roamed north of I-40 at the end of March. Just as news about her was spreading, she was found dead near Mt. Taylor. No cause has been released.

This roaming behavior is ingrained in young wolves and their moves north indicate suitable habitat is available. We have long urged the Fish and Wildlife Service to let wolves roam as they once did throughout the southwest, but so far the agency will not relent.

It’s also always jarring when Fish and Wildlife, tasked with recovering wolves, also removes them from the wild. Ranchers complained that the Mañada del Arroyo pack in the bootheel of NM preyed on their cattle. In May, even though the pack was denning, the agency captured the male and female parents and two pups and placed them into captivity. Even more disheartening, a third pup was euthanized in the den for being in poor health according to the agency.

Bowing again to livestock interests, Fish and Wildlife ordered one uncollared wolf to be killed from the Bear Canyon Pack in Arizona. But in a glaring instance of incompetence, a seven-year-old collared female was killed by mistake by the agency in April. No explanation has been offered for this error. The slain wolf may have been pregnant, making the fiasco even more tragic.

Shortly after, another wolf, Viento, of the Hail Canyon pack in New Mexico was also purposefully gunned down by Fish and Wildlife order. Both wolves had been accused of preying on livestock, but killing any one member of a pack to stop this behavior is controversial and scientifically questionable.

Emboldened ranchers in wolf country have continued to flex their political muscle. The Catron County Commission declared a wolf emergency in April and has asked Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham to declare a state emergency to release funds and provide National Guard assistance to “protect” the county from wolves. Sierra and Socorro counties have followed suit.

Even though Mexican wolves have never harmed a human, the fear mongering has been extreme. And funds are already available both for compensation for documented wolf livestock losses and for coexistence measures. The governor, thankfully, has not responded to this request.

It has taken almost a decade of advocacy, coalition building and meetings to produce a three-part bill that covers the oversight, mission and funding needs of the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish. The goal is to meet the coming environmental challenges not imagined when statutes first created the agency and the State Game Commission a hundred years ago.

The widespread support for this bill (SB 5) crafted by state Rep. Matthew McQueen, D-Santa Fe, and with strong advocacy by co-sponsors state Sens. Pete Campos and Crystal Brantley, R-Elephant Butte (a rancher and Republican working to secure additional Republican support), Senate Majority Leader Peter Wirth, D-Santa Fe, and Rep. Nathan Small, D-Las Cruces, has made the current version going to the governor’s desk.

This legislation overhauls an almost century-old approach, mission and funding source for managing our state wildlife. It provides a framework for better expertise and representation on the State Game Commission, authority to manage all wildlife species as deemed necessary by the newly renamed Department of Wildlife and receive enhanced funding from the Land of Enchantment Fund and newly established GRO (Government Results and Opportunity) fund starting at a combined $6.6 million annually to pay for additional staff and projects.

The bill was amended several times but all the sponsors and members of the large coalition of organizations backing it believe it will still strongly benefit wildlife and that the overall intent of the bill remains intact.

Nevertheless, after waiting on the Governor’s desk for three days, Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham vetoed the provision requiring that a Game Commissioner could only be removed for cause. But she signed the rest. Game Commissioners are now Wildlife Commissioners, the commission seat dedicated to a non-game oriented conservationist and the seat dedicated to a wildlife biologist remain. The Governor will still have to choose candidates for the Commission from a list provided by a nominating committee to further help filter politics out of the nomination process. The license fee increases (primarily raised for out-of-state hunters and anglers) will add another $10 million to the agency’s budget, and all wildlife, including pollinating insects and animals like bats and porcupines are now protected by NM law.

Thank you to everyone who contacted their legislators and the governor to help make this happen. We’ve come a long way since 1923 when the Game Commission and Department were first created. Here’s to another hundred years of vibrant wildlife populations in New Mexico.

Featured image: Almost all perching birds rely on insects for protein for at least part of their lives including this male Hepatic Tanager feeding his fledgling a beetle.

In October, the New Mexico Game Commission unanimously voted to approve new bear and cougar hunting rules that will be in place for the next four years.

The Commission failed to consider the effects of the massive Black Fire, the second-largest in state history, and its destruction of habitat in the Gila and is allowing 50 more black bears to be killed in that hunting zone. The season to pursue black bears with dogs will start in mid-August rather than the first of September in the Sacramento mountains of Southern New Mexico.

Cougar-hunting quotas remain unjustifiably high in 16 of 18 cougar zones. Cougar hunting with dogs is already allowed year-round, and that, sadly, will continue. Cougars and bears that die outside of hunting either, from depredation complaints or as roadkill, will not be counted against the hunting quotas.

Before the vote, Game commissioners offered no discussion beyond obsequious praise for the Department of Game and Fish and its proposals. No Game commissioner nor any representative of the Department responded to our extensive and well annotated concerns (you can find them here).

Dr. Ken Logan, a wildlife research biologist who spent 40 years studying cougars and documenting his work in peer-reviewed scientific journals with his wife, Dr. Linda Sweanor, sent written comments and testified that even if the cougar population numbers were accurate, the proposed 17-24% harvest rates would likely cause a decline in cougar populations. If cougar declines are not the intent, the science indicates that the harvest should be no more than 14% of the overall population. Because of the minimal information provided by the department, the public has no way to know if declines are the intent. Dr. Logan noted that most other western states have detailed statewide cougar management plans and that New Mexico should too. But he was thoroughly ignored. Also ignored were the thoughtful comments from more than 1,000 of you who emailed and testified in open meetings.

Never has it been clearer that New Mexico needs game commissioners who have the ability to critically review scientific information, see beyond the narrow goal of providing “hunter opportunity,” and understand the significance of large carnivores to the biotic community and the negative impacts that recreational hunting has on them. This will have to be remedied by the state legislature. Stay tuned.

Featured image of cougar by Mary Katherine Ray

After listening to the representative for New Mexico Game and Fish and testimony at Game Commission meetings and reading public comments received by the agency, one thing is clear: Everyone wants the hunting quotas of bears and cougars to be based on science. But what is also clear is that not everyone knows what constitutes actual science.

Some believe that if New Mexico Game and Fish claims a thing to be valid, then it must be valid. This is not science. This is placing a faith or belief in the agency’s claims without scrutinizing its methods or results. Science requires evidence that can be examined by everyone. It requires that calculations and results be transparently obtained.

Let’s examine the science behind the cougar kill quotas, for instance. This is the number of cougars that Game and Fish says can be killed in each “cougar management” zone without harming the cougar population in that zone. In 2010, the agency changed the way it estimated cougar populations based on non-published and non-peer-reviewed methodology that found that cougar densities and thus the cougar population in New Mexico was much higher than previously supposed. Since the kill quotas are based on a percentage of the population, those quotas also went up.

In 2017, the agency used a different methodology to estimate the population in cougar-management zone F. This resulted in a published, peer-reviewed paper — in other words, valid science. This research found that the 2010 estimate of the cougar population in Zone F was too high by 69%. Instead of an intended 25% harvest rate, the quotas had actually been allowing an 82% harvest rate — a severe overkill. In 2019, New Mexico Game and Fish implemented an emergency reduction of the cougar kill quota in that zone.

Then the agency reapplied the new methodology to Zone F and expanded the study area to include Zone B. Not only were the previous results for Zone F verified, but the population of Zone B was found to have been overestimated by 73%. And the kill quotas were actually allowing hunting of over three times the number of cougars that would be sustainable. The agency’s response was to combine zones F and B into one zone (the current Zone B) and reduce the kill quotas to match the new population estimate in that zone.

In 2021, the new, peer-reviewed methodology was applied to cougar Zone Q. Not surprisingly, once again, the cougar population was found to be much lower than estimated using the 2010 model, and thus the kill quotas were again found to be too high. This is why in the new cougar rule being proposed this year, the kill quota for Zone Q is being reduced by 50%.

Thus, three studies in three separate cougar-management zones that all used the same peer-reviewed scientific methods to produce accurate and precise results, all of which were conducted within the last six years, have overwhelmingly demonstrated that the population estimates from 2010 are severely inaccurate, grossly unreliable, and have consistently overestimated local cougar population sizes and the quotas based on these population sizes have been far too high. Yet the agency continues to rely on that unvalidated 2010 methodology that was never externally or independently peer-reviewed to derive cougar population sizes and prescribe hunting limits for the 16 other cougar-management zones. To say that the cougar hunting allowed in these 16 zones is based on valid science, or is conservation-minded, is patently false.

To estimate the population of black bears, New Mexico Game and Fish has begun to use the acceptable methodology of collecting bear hair samples as bears pass through baited stations rimmed with barbed wire set up at intervals in the study area. However, while the methodology is sound, its application may not be. The agency won’t reveal how the density determinations have been used to produce a population estimate. What is the size of the area? Instead, we are told that bear-management Zone 10, which encompasses the greater Gila bioregion, despite the drought and destructive fires of recent years, can support the killing of 35% more bears. The agency is also proposing to allow the killing of 6% more bears in Zone 1 in Northern NM. In neither instance can the public see the scientific details or justifications for these proposals. We are to take them on faith. This is not science.

The hallmarks of science demand that the way population estimates are derived and kill quotas set be transparent. There should be a management plan with clearly stated measurable objectives. It should all be open to external review especially by experts. In the case of the bear kill quotas and most of the cougar kill quotas, these hallmarks are missing. Except for three cougar-hunting zones, everyone who says they support the use of science when it comes to setting bear and cougar kill quotas in New Mexico by definition cannot support what NM Game and Fish is proposing to allow for the next four years.

Take action

The final decision won’t be made until the Oct. 27 Game Commission meeting. To participate via Zoom, go to www.wildlife.state.nm.us/commission/webcast/ for instructions a few days beforehand.
You may also still submit written comments about the hunting proposals until Oct. 27 at DGF-BearCougar-Rules@state.nm.us.

Read more

You are invited to read the highly detailed and referenced comment letters outlining the inadequacy of NM Game and Fish plans both for bears and for cougars submitted jointly by the Rio Grande Chapter of Sierra Club, Animal Protection of New Mexico, and the Humane Society of the US.
Comments on NMDGF’s cougar (Puma concolor) four-year rulemaking process
Comments on NMDGF’s black bear (Ursus americanus) four-year rulemaking process

Read the article

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 14, 2023

New Mexico’s iconic cougars and bears: More valuable than a stuffed trophy

ALBUQUERQUE, NM—New Mexico’s wildlife management agency is throwing caution to the wind by ignoring sound science and the state’s worsening climate threats, as they call for unsustainable and unjustifiable levels of bear and cougar trophy hunting. Game officials have doubled down on permitting trophy hunters to kill New Mexico’s rare and iconic black bears and cougars—864 black bears and 563 cougars annually—all with the aid of radio-collared hunting hounds—for each of the next four years.

“Our state’s black bears and cougars are worth far more than a stuffed trophy, and their cubs and kittens should not be chased with packs of radio-collared hounds across our wild landscapes” said Nina Eydelman, Chief Program & Policy Officer-Wildlife for Animal Protection New Mexico. She added, “New Mexicans greatly value and appreciate these rare wild animals, so as they struggle to survive amid extreme heat, fires, and drought, the public expects the state’s wildlife management agency to call for more conservation efforts on their behalf, not less. Tragically, that is not happening.”

“Obtaining an accurate population count of either black bears or cougars is very difficult,” said Mary Katherine Ray, Wildlife Chair, Rio Grande Chapter of the Sierra Club. “In New Mexico, there have been only a handful of now mostly outdated studies conducted for short durations and in select prime habitats risking an incorrect conclusion that populations are higher than they really are. There have been no repeat studies to examine population trends so there is no evidence that even current hunting levels are sustainable,” she stated.

As part of its bizarre public rulemaking process, the public must visit the agency’s website daily to see what new changes the agency is proposing as part of its black bear and cougar rule—during the agency’s public comment process—while the agency provides the public with no notice of their sudden changes. In other words, the NMDGF is changing the foundation that informs the public comment process in the middle of the comment process.

“The New Mexico wildlife management agency expects the public to adjust to its scattered, unorganized rulemaking process. The fate of keystone species like bears and cougars matters greatly to the majority of New Mexicans, and it is impossible to provide meaningful public input without knowing what specific changes are at stake and why,” said Eydelman.

Background

New Mexico Dept. of Game and Fish is finalizing the new rules for governing the trophy hunting of bears and cougars for the next four years. While the Game Commission is expected to vote on the bear and cougar rule on October 20th, the Department’s proposal will be finalized in September so the public must provide written comments by August 23rd to influence changes to the rule. Comments can be submitted to DGF-Bear-Cougar-Rules@state.nm.us.

The public is highly encouraged to attend the Game Commission meetings in person on August 25th in Raton and on October 20th in Farmington to voice their opinion about the bear and cougar rule. Remote attendance by Zoom is also available with registration in advance (see Commission calendar for details.)

The current quotas for both bears and cougars are unsustainable and will threaten local bear and lion populations, who are uniquely adapted to their arid environment.

Because these carnivores’ populations are hard to census, researchers of New Mexico’s cougar and bears have collected data sets only for short durations and in the very best habitats. Then the department extrapolates those higher population numbers statewide — resulting in inflated population estimates used to justify too-high, trophy-hunting quotas on bears and cougars.

The Department of Game and Fish must cut, not increase, hunting quotas and seasons to protect New Mexico’s bear and cougar populations to prevent the loss of some populations. Bears and cougars live on biological islands—their subpopulations are not well connected, and this results in inbreeding, if their population numbers are low.

New Mexico is currently experiencing a 20-year “megadrought,” the driest period in the Southwest since A.D. 800, and a record heat wave this summer. Additionally, New Mexico’s two record-breaking fires in 2022 consumed over 666,800 acres of primary wildlife habitat. High-severity fires burn up seed banks and leave barren moonscapes. Bears depend on berries, acorns, and other vegetation for survival. And if there are no plants for cougars’ prey, cougar numbers plummet too.

The consequences of trophy hunting on bears and cougars are dire because neither bears nor cougars evolved as prey animals. Therefore, hunting them in large numbers is unsustainable. They reproduce slowly, having litters only every other year — making bears and cougars especially vulnerable to overhunting. New Mexico’s bears first give birth when they’re about 5 years old, and, on average, trophy hunters kill females when they are 6. Females may reproduce only once before they’re dead.

Both bears and cougars hold intrinsic value. For example, they are highly intelligent and devoted mothers, who spend up to two years raising their young. Bears and cougars also hold ecological value. Bears spread more seeds than birds, and cougars leave more leftovers for other animals than other large carnivores, enhancing biological diversity.

APNM and the Rio Grande Chapter of the Sierra Club are urging the public to tell officials at the Department of Game and Fish they oppose their bear and cougar quotas and long trophy hunting seasons and to ask that kill quotas be significantly reduced to protect our valuable wildlife. Email public comments to DGF-Bear-Cougar-Rules@state.nm.us and attend the open Game Commission meetings on August 25th and October 20th to make your voice heard.

APNM has provided talking points on the issue here.

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Trapping season will be upon us beginning November 1. While we still are celebrating that the New Mexico Legislature passed and the governor signed Roxy’s Law banning traps from public land, it won’t take effect until April 1, 2022. The licensing year at New Mexico Game and Fish runs from April 1 to March 31. That is the timeframe in which all the rule booklets are printed and licenses issued. So there is one more winter in which it will still be legal to hide traps on National Forest, BLM and State Trust lands where the public may also be recreating.

This means one more winter where traps may be placed as close as 25 yards from official trails or roads without restriction, and even directly in the path of those that are “unofficial.” Hikers should carry a pair of cable cutters to free a dog caught in a wire snare — the device that killed Roxy by strangulation — and know how to open a steel-jawed leghold trap. There are videos on www.trapfreenm.org with clear instructions.

Every winter, we dread learning of dogs or wildlife caught in and injured by traps. You are legally allowed to rescue your dog but not wildlife. If you find a trap or trapped animal, you may contact New Mexico Game and Fish, especially if there are questions about legality.

The Operation Game Thief number is 800-432-4263. A warden should get back to you. Also, please let TrapFreeNM.org know.

Last winter, even before the passage of Roxy’s Law, trapping license sales, which number around 2,000 each year in New Mexico, were down by around 25%. Did the requirement that trappers spend a few hours completing a trapping education course dissuade license-buyers? Pelt prices also dropped, and that surely contributed. But trapping season will end on New Mexico public lands for the last time on March 15. Then we can truly celebrate!

Featured image: Bobcats are a frequent trap victim. Traps are allowed on New Mexico public lands until March.

Fishermen and river-running enthusiasts in New Mexico are the targets of a stealthy and well-funded campaign to bar recreational access to segments of the Rio Chama and Pecos Rivers, among others, where they cross private land.

The principal battleground is the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish, where five wealthy private landowners have pending applications for “certificates of non-navigability.” These certificates empower them to outlaw recreational entry to private property via the rivers. The Game Commission has postponed its decision on the new round of non-navigable applications to its regular meeting on August 12.

Please write the Game Commission at NonNav.Comments@state.nm.us requesting that it deny the five applications at the August 12 hearing. Per the flawed rule, public comments must be written — no oral comments allowed—and submitted by 5 pm July 29.

The landowner applicants have rallied under a banner styled the “New Mexico Habitat Conservation Initiative,” which, in 2015, brought legislation that sought to empower the Commission to declare portions of the state’s streams to be “non-navigable,” subjecting anglers and others to prosecution for trespass. The New Mexico Legislature declined to grant the Game Commission the authority the group of landowners sought.

Attorney Marco Gonzales is the public face of HCI and the lobbyist who presumably authored both the mostly failed SB 226 and Game and Fish’s over-reaching rule (DGF staff maintains that it had no role in crafting it). Gonzales steered SB 226 to its much-amended conclusion in 2015. He may have written the rule, which contains exact language removed from the law. His clients privatization certificates were issue Dec. 31, 2018, the last day of Governor Martinez’s administration.He represents the five current applicants for stream privatization. And he made more than $100,000 in campaign donations to candidates for high office during the 2018 election cycle.

The privatization rule was adopted in 2017 by a previous Game Commission, under then-Chair Paul Kienzle. Its language makes approving landowner’s applications almost a foregone conclusion. If an application is correct in form, it will be accepted by the Game and Fish director and rubber-stamped by the commission. The rule defies due process, requiring speedy action while permitting no testimony from parties who may, with evidence, oppose an application (e.g. the state’s many anglers and river-runners). Most egregiously, it allows applicants to appeal unfavorable decisions to state district court, while denying such a privilege to opponents.

After the 2018 election, the Game Commission decided to revisit the HCI scheme. Encouraged by no less than three attorneys generals’ opinions citing the public nature of the water flowing in New Mexico’s rivers and streams, the Game Commission, at its November 2019 meeting, decided to extend a moratorium on new applications and reopen the rule, with an eye to repeal or replacement. This move might have brought the commission into compliance with Article XVI — the public ownership of water provision — of the state Constitution and with case law affirming a right of public access.

At the end of 2019, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham declined to re-appoint Game Commission Chair Joanna Prukop, citing “differences of opinion.” Prukop has said her removal was a result of the commission’s reconsideration of the river-access rule (Prukop’s Santa Fe New Mexican op-ed is linked below).

In March 2020, counsel for three New Mexico recreation groups (the Adobe Whitewater Club, Backcountry Hunters and Anglers, NM Wildlife Federation) petitioned the state Supreme Court for a writ of mandamus, seeking clarification of whether the stream privatization rule is constitutional. US Sens. Heinrich and Udall and NM Wild filed amicus briefs in support. We are still awaiting a decision.

HCI, however, seems in no mood to wait. Last year, according to a source, Gonzales threatened to unleash a “tsunami of litigation” against the Game Commission if it did not approve the already-submitted applications. And he has begun to deliver: in March, federal magistrate Steve Yarborough, ruling on an HCI legal action, issued a declaratory judgement ordering the department to hear the pending applications. The General Services Department’s Risk Management Division declined to issue a notice of appeal, though doing so might have spared the Game Commission a great deal of time and potential embarrassment, should the rule be revoked.

This is where matters stand today. The Game Commission probably shouldn’t possess the power to decide who will enjoy the Rio Chama and Pecos River or other New Mexico streams. But thanks to this rule, they do. As the stream-access issue illustrates, money and influence are real, sharp tools in today’s world of public policy-making.

At its beginning, the ostensible objective of the Habitat Conservation Initiative seemed to be to protect private fishing waters that landowners had created or restored at their own expense. Much of the public testimony at legislative hearings in 2015 decried an invasion of anglers on the Pecos River and the trash and other depredations they brought with them. Certainly, no one deserves to have their privacy so invaded.

It may simply be that, in the landowners’ view, open access is a slippery slope to disastrous overuse of the public water and its finny residents. There is some logic behind this fear, though a civil discourse would have been the more prudent route to finding solutions to New Mexico’s growing habitat, access and privacy problems. There’s a darker possible motive as well, a desire of privileged newcomers to lock up swaths of New Mexico’s most desirable little rivers for their own exclusive retreats.

For now, the responsible users aren’t ready to surrender our right to boat or fish.

Related
Joanna Prokop’s editorial in the Santa Fe New Mexican – Conflict, confusion reign at State Game Commission
Money Trails – New Mexico Habitat Conservation Initiative
Adobe Whitewater Club – written comment to Game Commission (with additional links)
New Mexico Game & Fish Commission – meetings and agendas

Featured image by J. N. Stuart via Flickr.

As a new season brings new conflicts, advocates look to legislators to end trapping on New Mexico public land

As we prepare for the 2021 Legislature and the reintroduction of Roxy’s Law to prohibit traps and poisons from public land, already three dogs that have been caught in traps and a gruesome discovery of skinned coyote carcasses are indications of the toll ahead for wildlife and pets as the trapping season is underway. Roxy was a dog killed by strangulation in a wire neck snare as her owner could not save her two years ago.

So far this trapping season, a dog hiking with her person on state trust land near Aztec, N.M., was caught in a trap on Nov. 14. Luckily, cell service was available and the dog’s owner summoned several other people to come help remove the trap and get the dog to a veterinarian. The dog is OK, but as commonly happens, the owner is now afraid to take the dog hiking and risk a repeat of the ordeal.

A week later on BLM land north of Santa Fe, hikers found a dog not belonging to them languishing in a trap and near death. It wasn’t clear if the dog would survive, but she was rescued and rushed to veterinary care, where after several days stabilizing her condition and rehydrating her, she had surgery to remove two mangled toes. Most of her foot was salvageable. The vet bills are in the thousands of dollars.

On Thanksgiving day, a search-and-rescue volunteer was hiking for pleasure with her dogs, both highly trained, when one was caught in a trap, also on BLM land. Luckily, having had instruction on opening a trap, the volunteer was able to release the dog — though she reported it was not easy to do in real life. And thankfully in this instance, the time spent did not compromise a human rescue situation.

In November, a hiker near Santa Teresa, N.M., came upon the bodies of nearly 40 dead and skinned coyotes. At first, they were so unrecognizable without their skins that the hiker thought they were greyhounds. But the skin remained on the feet, and close examination of the photographs of the scene clearly show that some of these animals had limb injuries consistent with having been trapped. Aside from the psychological trauma to the person making this discovery, these injuries also belie a common trapper claim that traps are not injurious or inhumane to wildlife.

You can help to end this. Please sign the petition at our coalition website, trapfreenm.org. That way you will be also signed up to get alerts to contact legislators urging the passage of Roxy’s Law during the legislative session, whatever form it takes. Let 2021 be the year we stop the cruelty and the exploitation of trapping on New Mexico’s public lands and pass Roxy’s Law.

Featured image: Coyote leg trap, photo by Joyce Fay