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Transportation employees should be held responsible for slaying beavers |
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Written by Al Hollingsworth
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Saturday, 12 September 2009 |
If I owned a gun, which I don’t and never will, and visited a beaver colony and systematically wiped them out, the SPCA would have me in court before I could blink. So why aren’t those responsible for slaying the beavers last week in Bayhead, Colchester County facing charges?
Maybe not the ones who pulled the trigger, they were acting under orders. But certainly the twit(s) at the Department of Transportation who issued the edict should face the music. As their boss, Bill Estabrooks said, “Errors in judgment were made.”
The Transportation Minister was refreshingly open and frank when he said, “There were- let’s call it like it is – some mistakes that were made.”
Continuing, however, he innocently made the understatement of the year; “There probably would be a more diplomatic way to do it in the future.”
Right Bill, frankly I’m surprised they wasted bullets when a stick of dynamite or a grenade would have accomplished both tasks with one lob.
For those who missed it, the Department of Transportation had obtained a permit to destroy a beaver dam that was causing high water levels and was becoming a threat to the safety of a Route 6 bridge just outside the village of Tatamagouche. I would not take issue with that action because anyone in rural Canada with a smidgen of knowledge understands the havoc a beaver colony can create.
But after taking down the dam, they hunted down the beavers and one by one, sent them to their big river in the sky.
How cruel, how inhumane.
Estabrooks said the process is now under review, with officials looking at how the job was done.
“It is a concern because of course there’s a good and bad way to deal with animals in that particular challenging situation.”
As an aside, anyone wanting to see beavers in action doesn’t even have to leave the city. Just drive out to Kearney Lake, park by the supervised beach on Hamshaw Drive and check out the beaver dam that separates Little Kearney Lake from the main body of water.
By the way, don’t mention this to anyone at the Department of Transportation, on the off chance they haven’t used all their bullets.
(Al Hollingsworth is a retired journalist and broadcaster who has a cat and three dogs)
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