It's time snares were banned
SIR, — In the UK it is still legal to hang wild animals by the neck. Vast numbers of snares are deployed by gamekeepers every year in their war against the wildlife in our countryside.
Under the law it is legal to trap a wild animal in a snare by the neck for up to 48 hours, without access to food or water. It is legal to accidentally snare a pet dog or cat, and it is still legal to snare a fox, a hare or a rabbit.
The code of snaring good practice says that all snares should be inspected preferably twice a day, but that just does not happen and a failure to follow the guidelines is not a crime.
The law actually protects the snare and the person who sets it. Any wild animal caught in the snare ceases to be wild and becomes the property of the person who set the snare. Anyone else removing an animal from someone else's snare commits a theft. Amazingly, anyone damaging a snare to release an animal commits a crime.
All over the countryside snares are set to catch wild animals, and yet 40 percent of the animals caught are non-target animals like domestic pets. The suffering of the snared animal is dreadful, and yet all that cruelty to wild animals is currently legal.
It is high time that our wild animals were protected by law from cruelty, and it is time that those who cause them suffering are subject to the full force of the law. Please support Snare Aware Week and join us in our demand that the sale and use of snares be banned throughout the UK — just as they already are in most European countries.
DOUGLAS BATCHELOR
Chief Executive
League Against Cruel Sports
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Weather for Morpeth
Thursday 24 May 2012
Today
Sunny spells
Temperature: 10 C to 19 C
Wind Speed: 9 mph
Wind direction: North east
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 8 C to 18 C
Wind Speed: 10 mph
Wind direction: East
