Feds extending wildlife toxin consultations
Use of strychnine is raising welfare issues
The federal government is taking extra steps to find out if Canadians are still OK with killing wildlife in what one scientist calls “one of the worst ways to die on earth.”
The Pest Management Review Agency has extended public consultations into whether it should consider cruelty before licensing poisons used to control large predators such as wolves.
The most common of the three toxins under consideration is strychnine.
One of Canada’s largest users is the government of Alberta, which has used it to poison hundreds of wolves to help caribou herds survive in ranges heavily disrupted by industrial development.
“The use of pesticides to control large predators and the unintended effects on non-target animals is a growing concern among Canadians,” says the agency’s website.
Within 20 minutes of being dosed by strychnine, muscles start to convulse. The convulsions increase in intensity and frequency until the backbone arches and the animal asphyxiates or dies of exhaustion.
“Strychnine is one of the worst ways to die on earth in terms of pain and in terms of being conscious and aware,” said Ryan Brook, a professor in the University of Saskatchewan’s agriculture department.
“We have to do better. If you tried, I don’t think you could find a worse way to do it.”
Last fall, the advocacy group Wolf Awareness released a letter to the federal government calling strychnine and two other compounds inhumane. The letter was signed by 50 scientists and animal-welfare advocates from across Canada and three countries.
It’s time Canada modernized its thinking on predator control, said Barbara Cartwright of Humane Canada, the national voice for humane societies and SPCAs.
“There’s a great need to overhaul our wildlife management,” she said.
“It has to be targeted and effective. There also needs to be — and this is a growing concern around the world — minimized animal welfare harms.”
Strychnine opponents say the poison meets none of those standards.
Wolf Awareness has released documents showing that — along with 1,200 wolves killed by various means in Alberta since 2005 — at least 257 other animals have been poisoned, including 44 foxes and a grizzly bear.