FOR: WILDLIFE DAMAGE PROBLEMS

Control

Control is not justified because damage occurred, but only when human interests are significantly more valuable than the wildlife involved. This is not a moral and economic decision. Economic does damage assessment and control could be corrected out evaluation must determine if effective control can be accomplished for less cost than the appraised damage. Regardless of the details under question or wildlife species involved, the professional damage appraised should bear in mind the wide and often divergent social views related to the problems. An increasing segment of the public is interested in the positive values of wildlife and questions the necessity of wildlife populations. A different view is held by land resource managers and supervisors of land use industries who are responsible for a total resource operation. To form a proper policy of wildlife damage control, it is necessary to recognize fully these view points. Public attitude towards animal control have changed and so have those of control personnel. Formerly, numerous animals and bird species were grouped as pests, and control programs were aimed at their eradication. Some insects and lower animal forms are still regarded as wholly injurious, but this is generally not true for animals, birds, and most other vertebrates.

Today, extermination is not the goal of damage control programs. Indeed, it could be attained because of economic, technical, or biological limitations. Wildlife damage control programs should not be based upon animal population figures. Rather, the aim is to eliminate or reduce damage to a tolerable level. The amount of control to be applied should be the minimum necessary to achieve that objective.

The most frequent damage problems, control methods, and wildlife groups involved may be classified in several ways:

Nature of Damage

a) To other wildlife; for instance:

Predation on game species, such as antelope, boboat-wild turkey, recon duck-nesting.

Indirect damage, such as beaver activity making water temperature unbearable for trout.

To surrounding natural resources: for instance, rodent and big game damage to native vegetables.

To agricultural crops or other interests of economic value: for instance:

Deer – livestock forage competition.

Rodent damage to orchard and timber trees.

Migratory bird damage to cereal, fruit and vegetable crops.

Beaver and muskrat damage to water structures.

In wildlife- livestock disease transmission e.g., Anaplamosis in Deer from cattle and tuberculosis in wild pig from cattle, brucellosis in elk from cattle, Rinderpest in Buffalo from cattle.

Endangering of public health or safety. Examples are:

Wildlife-human health, rabies (fox, bat etc).

Bears or rattlesnakes at campgrounds.

Bird hazards to aircraft.

Deer-automobile collisions

Nature of the Animal and Their Habitats

Local or wide-ranging in feeding habits.

Migratory or non-migratory.

Native or introduced species.

Seasonal or year round activity

Legal Status of the Animal

1. Fully protected mammal or bird, parrots, patas monkey and cheetah.

1. Game mammals or birds; Deers and Elephant (timber and crop damage). Ducks (crop damage especially cereals).
2. Furbearer; muskrat (canal and stream baak damage). Beaver (causes flooding, out trees) weasels (kill poultry, game birds).
3. Non –protected, classed as pest or predator e.g. rats (health hazard, crop and poultry damage) starlings (city nuisance, crop damage).
4. Wild domestics: e.g. feral house cats (kill game birds). Feral dogs (kill games, livestocks).

Control Technology

Lethal control: Gassing and shooting wood ducks, poisoning orchard field rodents, special deer and hunts to lessen damage to vineyard, croplands and tree plantations.

 Preventive control: – This includes fencing, frightening devices, chemical repellants and trapping. Transfer of offending animals, carbide exploders and distress calls to repel blackbirds, bird roost repellants, live- trapping for beavers and grass cutters.

 Environmental control attempts in reducing animal damage by making the damage less attractive to the offending species or by improving habitat for them on attractive areas e.g. vegetation removal in airport vicinity to prevent starling concentration hazard to air craft, weed control in orchard to remove cover for mice at the base of trees, waterfowl refuges could also be provided to offer attractive resting and feeding areas as an alternative to croplands.

 Physiological control attempts at modifying the offending animals’ ability to survive resist other control measures or reproduce. For instance, in the control of blackbirds and starlings, the use of wetting agents to induce, exposure symptom and chemosterliant application in pigeon control.

 Crop damage insurance has been used in Canada in mitigating grain damage by water fowl and has been suggested for compensation for wildlife damage is not a control but an alternative to control. This compensatory approach to game damage may have a place, but it cannot be regarded as an ultimate solution as it ignores the reason for the wildlife conflicts.