Skip to content

Letter: Ban poison rodent traps in Duncan

Do it now, before more ills occur
25121659_web1_letter-fwm-210507-t_1

Dear Mayor and Council:

Use of commercial and residential rodent traps, baited with poisonous chemicals, in the City of Duncan and elsewhere in Cowichan — despite perhaps being deemed ‘safe’ by senior governments — can and should be banned from our city and across our verdant valley.

Such traps are widely advised against by veterinarians, ecological scientists, environmental and wildlife groups, pest-control pros, and citizen lobbyists.

Rodents that eat the bait die a painful death, while potentially poisoning other innocent wildlife such as eagles, hawks, crows, racoons, and even household pets.

Eco-concerns aside, poisoned rodents can enter homes, schools, stores, offices, and other buildings, find their roost inside walls and other holes, then die — leaving a sickening smell and expensively rendering the structure unsafe for human use.

Councillors, is this the right and only way to rid our city of rats, mice and other pests?

Experts claim there are alternative, compassionate, environmentally safe ways to achieve the same goal.

Those cogent alternatives include effective manual traps baited with peanut butter. Such methods can be sought, and taught by our knowledgeable, local pest-control folks.

I urge our green-leaning Duncan council to find and adopt those eco-methods now, before more toxic bait traps are set and more ills occur — perhaps leaving city taxpayers liable for needless damages.

Peter W. Rusland

North Cowichan