Public warned ‘you may be breaking the law if you tamper with traps’
COUNTRY walkers may be unwittingly breaking the law if they tamper with animal snares, it has emerged.
Yorkshire Water, which owns many of the open spaces we love to explore at weekends, has confirmed that animal lovers should not assume that traps are illegal.
The advice comes after Vicky Pickles spoke of her horror at finding snares while rambling around rural Calderdale.
She revealed she had spent an hour disabling them and had reported the matter to Yorkshire Water.
But Yorkshire Water told the Examiner that some snares were allowed for purposed of protecting endangered species from predators.
Most Yorkshire Water land is rented by tenants such as farmers or hunting groups.
Kirklees’ wildlife crime officer Pc Caroline Newsome, confirmed she had recently recorded a crime of deliberately damaged snares in the Huddersfield area.
A Yorkshire Water spokesman said it would be very hard for members of the public to tell the difference between legal and illegal traps and they should report them rather than disabling them.
They said: “We expect that all our tenants fully comply with both the law, and best practice guidelines if they choose to use traps and snares to control predators.
“We would encourage anyone who sees anything that they are concerned about to report it to either us or the Police so it can be confirmed whether the law is being followed.
“We take wildlife crime extremely seriously and if any of our tenants were to be convicted of a wildlife crime, they would have their tenancy terminated immediately.”
MPs voted to ban snares in 2016 but the government has never made it law, instead drawing up a new code of practice.
Glynn Evans, the British Association of Shooting and Conservaition’s head of game, said: “Modern fox snares, used in accordance with relevant Codes of Practice, are a humane and legal form of pest control used by conservationists, farmers, gamekeepers and land managers.
“It is important to remember that these modern snares are designed to catch and restrain. They have several built-in features such as stops, swivels and breakaway links to ensure animal welfare. They are a well-regulated, widely-used tool for managing pest species in the countryside in situations where other methods would be impractical, ineffective or dangerous.
“Should anyone find what they think might be an illegally set snare they should not touch, interfere or damage it. Doing so could potentially be an offence or compromise any subsequent investigation but should report the matter direct to the Police.”
But the League Against Cruel Sports said it was campaigning to have snares banned as the UK was “completely out of step” with most European countries.
It said: “The modern legal snare is meant to tighten around an animal and hold it quietly until the gamekeeper comes to kill it. But the reality is shocking. In their desperate struggle to escape, animals may be strangled, or may suffer horrible and sometimes life-threatening injuries, or a lingering death.
“Even if the snare doesn’t kill the animal, they may still die at the hands of a predator, dehydration or exposure to the elements.
“The League Against Cruel Sports is doing everything it can to protect animals from snares, as in the UK they are mainly set up by shooting estates to eliminate animals that predate on ‘game’ birds, and therefore this is a subject linked to cruel sports.
“Like landmines, snares are indiscriminate, because these traps can’t tell the difference between a fox, your pet or a protected species.
“As a result, the amount and diversity of animals that fall victim to these snare traps is immense. Snares capture any animal that happens to step into them. “
In 2012 a UK government study found only around a quarter of the animals trapped in snares were the intended targets (normally foxes).
“The remaining three quarters of the animals caught, severely injured or killed in these vicious nooses included hares,badgers, family cats and dogs, deer and even otters.
“Based on the government’s 2012 research, we estimate that snares may be trapping up to 1,700,000 animals every year.”