On Wednesday, after a day of impassioned public comment and sometimes baffling deliberations, the Colorado Parks & Wildlife Commission voted 6-4 to advance a citizen’s petition to prohibit the lawful sale, barter, and trade of wildlife fur. This vote is a win for animal rights groups, but it’s far from an immediate ban on fur sales. Above all, it’s a confusing mess, so let’s dig in, find out what’s going on, and figure out where we go from here.
Animal rights groups knew that Colorado Governor Jared Polis appointed several Parks & Wildlife Commissioners who are sympathetic to their cause, and so, in June of last year, these groups submitted a petition to the commission to amend Colorado’s regulations to outlaw trade in fur, with some exceptions.
But Polis’s pick for Colorado Parks and Wildlife Director, Laura Clellan, responded with a detailed letter highlighting the many problems with the petition: it couldn’t demonstrate any relationship between sales of fur and declining animal numbers, it didn’t acknowledge the existing strict regulations on take of furbearers, it cited misleading research that had nothing to do with Colorado, it conflicts with state statute, it would lead to the waste of pelts from animals trapped for nuisance control or crop protection, and its exceptions are badly defined and would create unenforceable rules.
For example, one of the carve-outs allowing fur sales would be for felted hats that are “crafted using heritage techniques like wet felting that promote sustainability and cultural craftsmanship.” Who will judge what a “heritage technique” is? What exactly is “cultural craftsmanship”?
In short, the petition is a complete mess. Director Clellan recommended that the commission vote no.
CPW knew that the hearing on the issue was going to be contentious–they switched venues to a large DoubleTree Hotel conference room and brought in extra security. During the almost four hours of public comment, both sides spoke passionately for their side. Hunters, anglers, and trappers were well represented, and opponents of the petition made up the majority of the comments. “I strongly oppose the fur ban petition,” Retired CPW biologist Jerry Apker said. “No matter how it’s dressed up, this is ideology and not science.”
The anti-trapping commenters repeated the arguments of the petition, but one line of reasoning stuck out in particular. Melinda Marquis, president and co-founder of Science for Colorado Wildlife, pointed out that, “The North American Model [of Wildlife Conservation] notes: fish and wildlife are ‘for the non-commercial use of citizens.’”
It’s worth taking a little time on this one, because Marquis seems to have a point: if the North American Model calls for the elimination of markets for game, then how can you justify selling furs, hides, taxidermy, antlers, and other inedible byproducts that come from wild animals?
The answer comes down to scale: well into the 20th Century, markets for wild game meat to feed growing city populations contributed to the extirpation and extinction of species. But markets of the time for fur were nowhere near as big or as threatening to overall populations, and bag limits and other regulations were extremely effective in restoring furbearer species without outright bans on commercial sale.
The Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies explains, “[Trapping] regulations ensure that harvests are consistent with sustainable-use principles, help manage conflicts between furbearers and humans, and foster support for habitat conservation.”
In the present day, trapping is so closely studied and tightly regulated that it doesn’t come close to threatening animals at the population level, and fees from licenses and permits pay into the system that protects the habitat of these animals, ensuring their future survival.
Nevertheless, the commission still voted to advance the petition, directing CPW to begin drafting rules to put a ban on fur sales in place. But, ironically, the incoherence of the petition works in our favor: those rules will be just as vague, contradictory, impossible to enforce, and incoherent as the petition itself. They also won’t be able to overrule state law, so it’s possible that they won’t take effect any time soon.
“The bottom line is that the real decisions were kicked down the road. We’re just not clear on what kind of regulation would actually come out of this vote,” said BHA’s Colorado Chapter Leader Bryan Gwinn.
Governor Polis is also term-limited, and insiders believe that no matter who the next governor is, that person’s appointees to the Parks & Wildlife Commission will be more qualified, and so rulemaking on fur sales will hopefully be turned back. Cooler heads may prevail eventually, and fur trapping and fur sales are far from dead in Colorado.
Still, we can’t forget the ultimate objective of these animal rights groups. Although this was just a petition on the sale of fur, not on trapping itself, Melinda Marquis of Science for Colorado Wildlife ended her public comment by saying, “Please institute a five-year moratorium on all trapping.”
Ultimately, these groups want to end hunting and trapping outright, and we can’t let that happen. That’s why we have to keep fighting, both for the sake of the activities we love, and also for the agencies that work on our behalf. Thanks to all of you who turned out to the hearing and made your voices heard: win or lose, that’s critical.
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