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December 04, 2006
Ignorance of the law is no excuse!
(And common sense is no defense....) I'm confused as usual. Unless I am reading the laws incorrectly, in Pennsylvania the Fish and Game Code applies to many animals we might normally consider nuisances or vermin. Let's start with some definitions of the animals subject to regulation: "Furbearers." Unless otherwise modified by regulation of the commission, the term includes the badger, the fisher, the mink, the muskrat, the opossum, the otter, the pine marten, the striped and spotted skunk, the beaver, the raccoon, all weasels, the red and gray fox and the bobcat.Notice that there are no exceptions for rodents or vermin such as rats, mice, moles, shrews, or squirrels, while backyard woodchucks are considered game. It's not as if the people who wrote these laws were unaware of exceptions. For whatever reason, raccoons have been exempted for reporting purposes -- but not other "wildlife": Sec. 2122. Report to commission officer.Hmmm.... Does the millions of homeowners and housewives know that each time they kill a mouse with a mouse trap or glue trap, an official report must be made? Or am I misreading the law? In vain I looked for nuisance exceptions which might apply to ordinary homeowners, but unless there is a general statute limiting the jurisidiction of Fish and Game, I could find nothing. Aside from an exception for the protection of cultivated lands from damage the only one I can find is for protecting the life of a human -- and it's quite specific: 2141. Killing game or wildlife to protect person.Absent an attack on a human, or clear evidence of rabies, I don't think that would apply to the average nuisance animal. Killing mice is illegal? Where is my common sense? you might ask. Such laws were written many years ago -- often at the behest of hunters who wanted to protect game, in an era when common sense prevailed. But as more and more bureaucracies like "fish and game" become infiltrated and staffed by people who believe in the animal rights philosophy, the less likely that common sense can be taken for granted as it once was. Philadelphia's Mayor Street, for example, has long been under attack for his rat eradication program, but reading the above laws, I'm now wondering why no one sought to enforce fish and game regulations against harassing, driving, or killing rats. At least in California they've spelled these things out: Common mouse and rat traps are exempt from being marked, per T-14 section 465 (g), "Except for common rat and mouse traps, all traps used pursuant to this subsection must be numbered as required by subsection (f) (1)".To be fair, there are still bureaucrats in Pennsylvania possessed of common sense, and the Department of Fish and Game has a web page offering advice on how to deal with "Nuisance animals": Groundhogs and moles are lawn excavators that can make a mess of a yard quickly. Both problem animals are best handled through trapping. Groundhogs can be caught with baits such as apples, carrots or lettuce. Moles are best removed with hole or bayonet-type traps, which kill the animal as it passes through a trap armed with spring-loaded bayonets that is placed in the animal's underground runways.Good advice, to be sure. But is that legal? The only exception in the section dealing with killing game or wildlife is for raccoons, but additionally, there's a section on "disturbing game or wildlife" and its interpretation: Sec. 2162. Disturbance of game or wildlife.I'm intrigued by an apparently very broad exception -- that "this section shall not apply to any owner of land." Does "any owner of land" mean anyone who owns land anywhere? Or does it only apply to incidents pertaining to the land he actually owns? Is a tenant considered an "owner" of land, or must tenants go to their landlords for assistance with nuisance animals? So, while it would seem to be illegal for me to kill them without filing a report, it might not be illegal for me to merely "drive or disturb" rats, mice, or squirrels in my own yard. However, elsewhere it is declared to be illegal to allow a dog to do so: Subchapter E. Dogs Pursuing Game or WildlifeAgain, go back and read the definition of "wildlife." (If the dog chases any "big game animal" -- defined as "the elk, the whitetail deer, the bear and the wild turkey" -- the dog is automatically declared a "public nuisance under Section 2384. Which means that if a bear enters my yard, I have to go out and confront him all by myself.) Even assuming there's an exception for me as an "owner of land," that exception is specifically limited only to that section, and not the section dealing with dogs. I can chase mice and squirrels in my own yard. But Coco can't. I ran this past Coco (who is a dog), who has often been annoyed by vermin in the yard, and occasionally in the house. She thinks it's quite unfair that dogs are being singled out when by far the biggest offenders are cats. Furthermore, cats are much more successful as predators than dogs, and they're freely allowed to slaughter not only rodents, but birds of all varieties -- without regard to their rarity or protected status. In a word, it's unfair discrimination. Now, we don't think of the Fourteenth Amendment as applying to dogs and cats, but considering that if Coco chases a squirrel I'm the one who'd be the criminal, I think I might have a good Equal Protection claim if cat owners are not prosecuted for the same act -- especially if I could demonstrate that cats kill more wildlife than dogs. (This is not to say that I support these laws; only that they should be fair and evenhanded, and reasonably calculated to achieve the goal of wildlife protection.) At this point, I'm more confused than ever. I don't know what's illegal and what's not. (And to think I was trained as a lawyer!) posted by Eric on 12.04.06 at 09:27 AM |
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