River otters were among the many victims of our centuries-long rape of this continent. But now that conservation efforts have allowed us to take the river otter off South Dakota’s list of threatened species, we can get back to needlessly killing them.
South Dakota opened its first-in-a-long-time river otter trapping season last Sunday, November 1. We allowed trappers to snare and butcher fifteen of the critters, which limit was met by Friday morning. Trappers killed six otters in Moody County, four in Minnehaha, two in Hamlin, and one each in Roberts, Grant, and Brookings.
I wonder if otter killing is one of those activities that keeps us from fully staffing our local fire departments. Otter killing certainly isn’t a necessary economic or ecological intervention: a season limit of 15 suggests their population is a long way from needing human control. And touting another annual festival of unnecessary slaughter isn’t going to help us grow our human population: believe me, no one is moving to South Dakota just for the opportunity to kill otters.
republican ignorance shows through again and again. republicans are clueless about the environment. Show me a republican that is concerned about the environment and I will show you a Democrat.
The river otter is a very important piece of our entire Eco system. Where they exist in our rivers, that environment is healthy. republicans want to get rid of them so they can pump sewage from CAFO’s into those waterways.
” Otters also have a pivotal role in river ecosystems. They are predators, meaning they help control the populations of food species they prey upon. This affects the ecosystem as a whole, and as a result, their presence is a signal that the ecosystem is healthy.”
Democrats and Independents, build, republicans steal and destroy.
At the GF&P commission meeting the testimony was overwhelming to not pass the Otter season. But, like with Deer tags and almost every other issue brought before the Commission, what ever Kristi says and Hepler enables is what is done. There has never been a species removed from the threatened list and a season opened in the same year in the US —- once again SD has a first. The trapping bounty program was opposed by a very strong majority of the people that buy licenses and support the GF&P, but we were ignored again because Kristi said it would happen. There has never been a documented study that a bounty system helps wildlife, cost effectively. The money spent was to go to habitat —- a much more valuable tool for wildlife. The Legislature folded to property rights advocates in overturning 140 years of established water law by closing public water to the public. The majority keeps voting these people in that don’t share the values of our environment, habitat, wildlife and sportsmen/women.
Up until this year, there were about 15 otters taken each year accidentally —– that we know of —- chances are there were more. So, now with the 15 otter season we will be taking at least 30 and probably more. I use to trap so I understand this, traps do not discriminate between targeted species and what ever happens to get in them. Drown sets, usually where otters are going to be, kill everything, especially conibears. I support trapping to control musk rats, beaver etc., but to purposely open a season on a recovering species is environmentally unconscionable.
It is unusual for a state to de-list a species when that species is not demonstrating dramatically improving numbers. The rationale expressed by South Dakota officials is weak and reflects yet another anti-science demonstration. I remind readers that our state’s otter numbers do not indicate some state-sponsored restoration successes or habitat increases. What has the State of South Dakota done to improve otter numbers? Almost nothing. If it hadn’t been for a very modest effort by the Flandreau Sioux Tribe to re-introduce about 35 otters on the Big Sioux River in the late 1990s the state’s otter numbers would likely be near zero. Here’s how our state stacks up relative to our neighboring states. Minnesota: over 12,000 otters. Iowa: 4,000. Nebraska: 7,000. North Dakota has not kept records. South Dakota? Less than fifty “sightings” in each of the past several years. Embarrassing. Non-sensical.
Last time i chatted w/ RCFD about its killing beavers and removing dams in RC on Rapid Creek in the Gap, one of them said “beavers are nothing but pests”. That maybe a fact but these critters w/i city limits makes for an ecosystem, imo). (C) Allender administration.
Doesn’t USACOE have permitting jurisdiction for streambed disruption?
Jerry, good point: otters suffered significantly from water pollution. Having them back in our waters provides a good check on our water quality. Kristi apparently is as eager to get rid of those otters as she is to get rid of the DENR.
SDSlim and Pete, thanks for those notes! It’s remarkable that our new otter season came so hastily, and without any hard data saying the otter population is on a strong recovery trajectory that can sustain any level of increased human predation.
Dang, why can’t we get some legislators to talk about protecting otters? Can’t we even win a vote on cuteness in the Legislature?
These little creatures are kind of cute but are filthy, disease bearing weasel-like thing.
How is it that this season happened if the legislatures didn’t approve it and why did only 15 people get to hunt them? This seems like a prime opportunity for some conservative conservationists to get their fellow in the legislatures to bring a law bill to out-law this.
Grudz: The legislature should revisit it’s efforts of 1978 and 1979, (if memory serves) and Sunset Title 41 entirely and start over, leaving the Commission and Secretary completely out of the program. GFP needs to be autonomous from the Governors office.
South Dakota republicans have never figured out that visitors to our state love to see the wildlife. They go through the Badlands to see pronghorns, buffalo and those crazy prairie dogs. Instead of killing everything that is helpful to the whole system and would bring tourists to see nature at it’s finest, the killer queen wants to eliminate the idea.
We only want death like the Sturgis Rally to define what republican legislators stand for. Nothing for the kids to see here in the eastern part of the state but CAFO’s. Nothing that tells them that we here do understand climate change and the environment and we have the River Otter to show that. We’ve become a disgrace to ourselves through our leaders.
The Game Fish and Farce.
Mr. JW, so you advocate for an elected Commission or an elected Commissioner to oversee all the otter issues? That would be interesting.
Grudz—— The GF&P does set the season on otters. If you read my post you would understand that. Problem is the GF&P Commissioners, the Sec. and the Directors/supervisors all serve at the pleasure of the Gov. And, I have advocated for the control of the people’s wildlife by the GF&P instead of the legislature for many years. The Legislature is strictly politics, and have no experts in their ranks on managing wildlife or resources. Our laws were set up to try to buffer the politics out of wildlife management and our resources, like water, soil, forests and air ——– but the politicians just keep trying to inflict their will on everything.
Grudz —– the recent push by Noem to combine the Dept. of natural resources and the AG Dept is a perfect example. Over 90% of the time the two departments are representing a different side of the issues before them —- do you really think Kristi wants to combine them to make management of our resources better? I think it is nothing more than a blatant attempt to circumvent the state laws on protecting resources and diminishing our states ability to regulate pollution and degradation of resources like water, soil and air —- not to mention the will of the SD people!
What’s next COVID Kristi? Hunting seasons for puppies and kittens?
Holocaust against the otters. Led by Covid kristi. Oppose and defeat her. She is making life manifestly unsafe for humans and otters. Defeat her once and for all in 2022. And her enablers too, all of them, 100%.
Hunting river otters is some real late empire behavior.
Give otters the vote.
They *eat* zebra mussels, as the experts say.
Here’s what I don’t understand: clearly river otter populations are much higher along the Big Sioux & areas along the Missouri River. So, if there is going to be a trapping season, why a statewide trapping season that could easily extirpate them from areas where their numbers are extremely low?
This makes me incredibly hesitant to report an otter sighting in any area where their numbers are more limited because if that information is made publicly available, we could easily lose them in areas where they’re just getting re-established.
We…./trapping otters?? Just more blood lust from the Republicans.