Will San Francisco Be Next City to Ban Vile Glue Traps? Commission of Animal Control Votes ‘Yes’
For Immediate Release:
September 11, 2025
Contact:
Nicole Perreira 202-483-7382
This evening, the San Francisco Commission of Animal Control and Welfare voted unanimously to pass a recommendation calling for a citywide ban on the sale and use of glue traps—trays coated with a sticky adhesive that ensnare small animals, who can suffer for days before dying with their faces and limbs mired in the glue. According to San Rafael-based wildlife hospital WildCare, since just 2024, nearly fifty animals—including dozens of songbirds, a baby California Quail, a young squirrel, and an opossum—have been caught in glue traps and brought to their facility in need of lifesaving care. Thousands more have died in these traps without receiving any help or care.
The vote follows efforts by PETA, which included multiple presentations to the Commission about the cruelty and dangers of glue traps. PETA is now joining with the Commission, local animal hospitals, and wildlife rehabilitators to call on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors to pass a citywide glue trap ban.
“Animals caught in glue traps face a terrifying and agonizing death as they scream, panic, and rip their own skin off in a desperate attempt to escape,” says PETA President Tracy Reiman. “PETA is celebrating today’s step forward and urges the San Francisco Board of Supervisors to take up a ban on these vile devices.”
Wildlife—including birds, snakes, lizards, rats, and squirrels—who get stuck in the glue struggle desperately to escape, sometimes chewing off their own limbs before succumbing to starvation, dehydration, asphyxiation, or blood loss. Glue traps fail as a long-term solution because they neglect to address the source of the problem: As long as food remains accessible, more animals will move in to take the place of those who have been killed.
Hundreds of companies and entities, as well as countries including England, Iceland, Ireland, New Zealand, Scotland, and Wales; two Australian states and one territory; and more than 30 states and union territories in India have all banned glue traps. If San Francisco bans glue traps, it will become the third and largest American city to do so after West Hollywood and Ojai.
PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to abuse in any way”—points out that Every Animal Is Someone and offers free Empathy Kits for people who need a lesson in kindness. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow PETA on X, Facebook, or Instagram.
