Trapping is fine, it’s the dog’s fault

In Spearfish, SD, the Game, Fish and Parks Department (in that order, please) responded to the fatal trapping of a companion dog by asserting the dog shouldn’t have been around. Booper, the companion dog of Jim Viergets, was killed by a bobcat trap set in the Harrison-Badger-Trucano game production area.

GF&P supervisor, Mike Kintigh, said protecting pets is secondary to providing hunting and trapping. “These areas were bought with sportsmen’s dollars for the taking of game, both by hunting and trapping,” Kintigh said. “We don’t want them on our property like that.” Viergets and other neighbors of the 2,000-acre “game production area” say dogs frequently use the area for play and exercise.

“If the land is just for hunting and trapping, that’s what they need to tell you,” Viergets said. “It’s public land. We all pay for it.”