Urge Your Mayor and Councillors to Help Ban Cruel Glue Traps Now!
Next week, delegates at the Union of BC Municipalities convention in Vancouver, British Columbia, will be voting on a resolution asking the provincial government to ban the use, sale, and distribution of cruel glue traps, which kill, injure, and permanently disable countless small animals every year. We need your help to get this historic resolution passed!
A glue trap is a small board covered with a sticky adhesive designed to ensnare any animal who wanders across its surface. These devices inflict slow, painful deaths on mice, rats, birds, chipmunks, bats, lizards, squirrels, and other animals small enough to get caught in the glue. They can take days to die of starvation, dehydration, or blood loss while they cry out in agony.
The animals panic and struggle, which causes them to become even more ensnared. Often, the adhesive tears off patches of their fur, feathers, or skin—and some animals even chew off their own limbs in a desperate effort to escape. In other cases, their noses, mouths, or beaks get stuck in the glue, causing them to suffocate to death over the course of hours. Or they die from being crushed in the garbage, which is where the instructions on the traps advise consumers to put them.
By banning glue traps, British Columbia would join an ever-growing list of places—including England, Iceland, Ireland, New Zealand, Scotland, Wales, much of Australia and Belgium, two American cities, and more than 30 states and union territories in India—that have already banned these cruel devices.
Please e-mail your mayor and councillors urging them to support a provincewide ban on glue traps. You’re welcome to use the sample letter at the bottom of this page. You can find the contact information you’ll need by searching the name of your city or town at CivicInfo BC and clicking on its name, which will bring you to a new page. Scroll down and you’ll see the mayor and councillors listed under “Elected Officials.” Click on each name to access that person’s e-mail address.
Please feel free to use our sample letter, but remember that using your own words is always more effective.