Wales must lead the way for animals and end the cruelty of snaring
Posted 27th April 2021
Imagine you’re running free, in the open, in peace. Now imagine you’ve been trapped, a thin metal wire holding you in place, digging into you as you struggle to free yourself. That’s what happens to animals unfortunate enough to be caught in a snare.
Snares are man-made devices that intentionally injure and kill animals. That should be reason enough for them to be banned, yet they are legal and used extensively by the shooting industry to protect ‘game’ birds from predators. You don’t need me to tell you that snares are barbaric and cruel, but what many don’t realise is that the victim is very often not the ‘target’ animal. Any animal can be unfortunate enough to become a victim of snaring, sadly this includes our pets too.
As an animal lover it is heart breaking for me every time I hear a story of an animal being caught in a snare. I have a rescue dog. Seeing him or any beloved companion suffer at the hand of such a barbaric device doesn’t bear thinking about and yet sadly this is a common occurrence.
In Wales, the League recently highlighted two stories of a cat and a pet fox being unlucky enough to become trapped in snares. Both were fortunate to live but cruelly each lost a leg. Neither was the intended target of a snare but that didn’t protect them.
My natural instinct, as I’m sure yours is too, is to protect animals. The most powerful thing all of us can do is to use our voice, and our vote to protect animals. Where animals cannot speak up, we must. That is why the League is calling on candidates for the Senedd to ban the sale, possession, manufacture and use of snares in Wales. You can help with this too, use our simple tool to write to candidates for Senedd in your area today.
Snaring can hurt any animal, by allowing them to legally lie hidden in our countryside we, as a nation, are failing our wildlife. We’re leaving all animals, wild or domesticated at risk from completely unnecessary, avoidable pain and suffering. A ban on this practice in Wales during the next Senedd term would increase the pressure immeasurably on the rest of the UK’s nations to follow suit.
I’m urging Wales, a country and countryside I know well from my university days, to be the leading force to end snaring in the UK. If we want to really deserve our reputation as a nation of animal lovers, then let’s start here!
It’s painful, its cruel, its indiscriminate and it is nothing less than torture. It must be banned for good.
Take action today to ensure your Senedd candidates commit to banning snaring in Wales.