A New Brunswick woman says she was devastated to find a dead beaver in a trap at her favourite walking trail in Memramcook, N.B., and questions why the traps were set in the first place.
“It was disgusting and I was wondering why a village wants to kill their own animals in their own park. That’s immoral,” said Annie LeBouthilier.
LeBouthilier was eager to go for a walk on Wednesday after the ban on going into the woods — due to the wildfire risk — was lifted in the province.
She loves seeing the beavers that live in the water in LeBlanc Park, and was heartbroken to see one of them killed in a trap.
She contacted the municipality, which owns the park, in search of answers. She was especially concerned because this particular trap and additional ones were left accessible to the public and could have hurt someone.
According to the municipality, the beavers were creating a blockage to the irrigation system for the neighbouring golf course, which it also owns.
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“As everybody knows, it’s a drought at the moment, and greens are expensive to maintain and die with lots of heat,” said Mayor Maxime Bourgeois
“It’s a major asset in Memramcook, obviously, so it’s important to bring water to the golf course.”
The mayor says that while the adult beavers were trapped and relocated, that course of action wasn’t possible for the young.
“From what I understand, the traps to catch them, to relocate them, the traps themselves that the trapper had, they were too (big) for the smaller (beavers). So (the trapper) was obligated to use a different type of trap that kills them,” he said.
The mayor says the municipality plans to examine its policies moving forward.
“I just hope that what happened to these beavers is a lesson for other municipalities,” said LeBouthilier.
While beaver trapping season officially begins in October in New Brunswick, a spokesperson for the Department of Natural Resources told Global News that it’s legal for municipalities to remove beavers that are causing damage to infrastructure outside of those dates.
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