The Saskatoon Wildlife Federation is exterminating its controversial gopher derby in 2004.
“It served its purpose and we’ll take a look at it again next year,” said federation business manager Len Jabush.
The derby was shelved for a variety of reasons – gopher populations are expected to be down, there was a lack of interest in last year’s event and it had become a costly endeavour for the nonprofit group.
Jabush said the federation spent an estimated $3,000 on prizes and promotional efforts since the event was launched in 2002.
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Since then, varmint hunters have turned in approximately 100,000 gopher tails. The inaugural event attracted 211 entrants, but the numbers fell to 120 last year.
The derby has garnered international condemnation from animal rights groups who say it is a mean-spirited and ineffectual campaign. Jabush said that had “absolutely zero” bearing on the federation’s decision to cancel this year’s competition.
“If anything, we were thinking about running it just to annoy them.”
Sinikka Crosland, president of the Responsible Animal Care Society, bristles at that comment.
“What kind of motivation is that?”
She said the cancellation reinforces a point she has been making all along, that gopher populations are cyclical and will be controlled by Mother Nature.
Crosland understands that producers need to protect their crops and equipment, but said an event like a gopher derby is in poor taste.
“I certainly don’t like the idea of wildlife being used for target practice.”
Jabush said the competition served a useful purpose. One landowner near Lake Diefenbaker had 1,100 gophers killed in his fields in a single morning.
He said the negative publicity hasn’t affected membership numbers but it has unfairly tarnished the reputation of the federation.
“A lot of people have the image that we’re nothing but a bunch of redneck killers.”
They don’t understand that the primary purpose of the association is to conserve wildlife and preserve natural habitat. Jabush said his group has spent $1.5 million on those two causes over the past 20 years.
For producers considering other control methods, there is a new product on the market. Fairview Gopher Cop RTU. is a strychnine-treated grain that will be available to producers through municipal offices this spring.
It differs from previous premixed product because it is shipped wet, shortly after being treated. Maxim Chemical, the Regina-based company that makes the gopher poison, said farmers will have it available within 48 hours of treatment.
The treated grain will be delivered to RM offices in refrigerated vans so the product maintains the scent and taste that appeals to the rodents. The company is waiting for a shipment of strychnine to arrive from India but said it is confident it will have product available for spring.
