Trapping in Defense of Property
There are little protections for wildlife in Vermont that are considered a "nuisance" by landowners. The statute that covers "Wild Animals Doing Damage" is dangerously broad and results in the senseless killing of foxes, beavers, bobcats, and other animals with zero oversight. Property owners and municipalities are not required to report animals killed in defense of property, therefore Vermont Fish & Wildlife has little to no data on the number of animals that are killed each year.
Landowners may use poison and also use traps like neck snares and toothed/serrated leghold traps that are otherwise prohibited for use by in-season trappers.
This lax law results in tragedies like the case of the red fox who was seen in Hyde Park, Vermont dragging a leghold trap from her leg for days before she was captured and euthanized due to her injuries. It's suspected that the landowner was unfamiliar with how to set traps which resulted in the fox pulling the trap out of the ground. The landowner claimed that he was trying to trap a fox who was getting into his chicken coop, but there's no proof that the fox who was gravely injured was even the fox he was targeting. Landowners are not required to hold a trapping license to trap on their property under this statute (trapping in defense of property), so they may be totally unfamiliar with how to use leghold and body gripping kill traps, which only adds to the animal's suffering.
Also, animals are often killed at times of year when they're tending to their young, which results in their offspring becoming orphaned. The fox kits pictured below were orphaned when a homeowner killed their mother. They were thankfully brought to a licensed VT wildlife rehabilitator. Below photo credit: Howling Mountain Wildlife Rescue
People may hire "nuisance" wildlife control operators (NWCOs) thinking that the animal will be humanely caught in a cage trap and relocated since NWCOs rarely explain their methods. The reality is that when NWCOs remove an animal from a location, the animal is killed off site since relocation is not allowed under law.
Prior to legislation that we helped pass in 2018, NWCOs did not even have to possess a VT trapping license. There was a bill before the legislature, H.262, that sought to require training and other requirements for NWCOs, but that bill was never enacted. A NWCO set a trap to kill beavers in Proctorsville and ended up trapping a great blue heron by the leg in a leghold trap. The animal's leg was so badly injured that it was euthanized. Tragedies like this are not uncommon.
The only humane NWCO that we are aware of is HEART Wildlife out of Burlington. We highly recommend their services! You can learn more about them HERE.