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Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) has announced that furbearer trapping and hunting seasons are underway. Trappers should note special permit requirements for fisher and marten trapping seasons.
Fisher and marten are medium-sized members of the weasel family, which also includes ermine, mink, and river otters. While fisher have been expanding their range in recent decades, New York’s marten are restricted to the Adirondacks.
Coyote hunting season began Oct. 1 across much of the state, and hunting seasons for other furbearers such as bobcat, raccoon, and fox began on Oct. 25. Season dates and zone boundaries for all furbearers can be found in the Hunting and Trapping Regulations Guide.
Trappers are reminded of changes to trapping regulations for fisher that began in 2016, including the requirement of a special permit, and expanded opportunities for fisher in select Wildlife Management Units in central and western New York. All fisher and marten trappers must obtain a special, free permit from their regional wildlife office, submit a trapping activity log, and submit the skull or jaw from harvested fishers and martens.
To obtain a free fisher or fisher/marten permit, trappers should contact the regional wildlife office or apply by e-mail. Only one fisher or fisher/marten permit is needed to trap these species anywhere in New York where the season is open. Trappers must provide the following information:
Name
DEC ID # (from license or back tag)
Mailing address
Phone or e-mail
Species (fisher or fisher/marten)
If requesting a permit by e-mail, include the county or WMU where you plan to trap fisher and/or marten.
To apply by e-mail: wildlife@dec.ny.gov; type “Fisher/Marten Permit” in the subject line.
Photo of coyote by Steve Thompson, courtesy USFWS.
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Trapping is proving to be inherently cruel and absolutely unnecessary. Anyone in doubt simply has to go to social media for confirmation where selfies and telling comments abound. It’s not for no reason that anti-cruelty to animals statutes are not legally applied to our wildlife.
How many trapped Adirondack coyotes will end up as submissions to coyote killing contests in NY State? I’ve never agreed with the assumption that “we have enough of them” justifies the indiscriminate killing of any species for “sport”.
Is a hat and mittens made from a local fur worse than such made from petroleum based process and flown across the planet so we can all drive to wall mart and purchase for dirt cheap?
I live in NJ . The coyote here are killing small dogs and others pets all over Bergen county. When they eat your dog will you be so forgiving?
If you let your dogs run free at night then they are rightfully subject to the laws of nature. If your dog is left chained up outside at night you really are too irresponsible to have a pet in the first place.
Traps can kill a dog or cat as easily as a coyote. Ecosystems without predators are sick ecosystems. Trapping does not single out old or sick individuals like predators will.
When will the otherwise relatively progressive State of New York catch up with science and stop the killing of predators? Hope seems slim when we also cannot recognize the need for fully protecting our last, most remote wildernesses.
Traps! This has got to be one of the most horrible, cruelest ways to kill a wild animal. There has to be a moral inferiority to even have the urge to take up this kind of sport if this is what you call sport. I think what should be done so as to get a fair opinion on the matter from Joe and Mary public, so as to either keep with the practice or abolish it, is to set an example by using humans as prey to enlarged versions of said traps, and the perfect model for such should be those who are in favor of the practice in the first place.
I think it’s a great idea! Inform them of a special hunt…for an expensive flat screen tv say. Set up a human size trap in the woods, bait the area with popcorn leading to a television and set them on their way. As they go towards the tv…SNAP! Just a few examples is all that is needed so that a lesson can be learned, two at the most. These two examples will be known as sacrifices. Set up a camera and a recording device near the site of trap so that a visual and cries of agony can be heard. Show the footage on television to a target audience, an audience that will act and put up a resistance to this practice once they get a firsthand account of its horror. Let the audience know that we had to sacrifice these two people to liken the plight of the animals who die this same way by the thousand lots every year in this country due to trapping practices. The audience will object to it immediately and when they have learned that the two sacrifice’s were trappers themselves they will be relieved of any sorrow they had for them.