Gopher control underway in Regina parks; wildlife advocate concerned

The City of Regina is warning pet owners of poison in the city’s parks.

It has started its annual gopher extermination program, where poison is placed in burrows to kill the rodents.

Yellow signs that read “gopher control” are set up at any park where the poison has been deployed.

Russell Eirich, the City’s manager of open space services, said pet owners need to keep an eye out for those signs. He said if a dog were to eat the poison or a gopher that had been poisoned, it could get sick or die.

“Pet owners should be keeping their animals on leashes in the parks … Just avoid those areas for the few weeks that we’re out doing this. When we take the signs down, we know that the space is safe again,” he explained.

He said the City has been poisoning gophers every spring for about 10 years.

“Gophers are a declared pest by the province of Saskatchewan. Because of that, all municipalities are required to eliminate gophers on public spaces.”

Wildlife advocates concerned about the program

Some worry that exterminating gophers could have a major effect on pets as well as wild predators like owls, hawks, eagles and falcons.

Bonnie Dell, the president of the Wildlife Rescue Society of Saskatchewan, said any animal that eats a gopher that has already consumed the poison could die.

“The animals that are poisoned take a long time to die. They can appear to be in distress by trembling and moving awkwardly, which makes them stand out to a predator as easy prey,” she said in an interview with 980 CJME.

She’s also concerned that Rozol RTU, the poison the city is using, takes a few days to kill the gophers.

“If they’re putting poison down the holes, (the gophers) are not necessarily going to ingest the poison in the hole and stay there as they slowly die. They do come above ground. They could go anywhere if they have days in which they’re slowly deteriorating,” she explained.

Eirich said secondary wildlife poisoning is not a major concern.

“We haven’t experienced that in the 10 years. We haven’t had any collateral damage,” he said.

Other than predators, scavengers like crows and magpies could also be affected by eating the corpse of a poisoned gopher.

“We are out there and we are trying to do those daily pickups, so (secondary poisoning) is not something that we have experienced,” he said.

Eirich also added that the City combs the park for bodies every night. However, Dell said her wildlife rescue hotline has received multiple reports of dead or ill gophers since the program began.

The slow death from Rozol RTU isn’t the only issue Dell has with the poison.

“To hemorrhage to death, slowly, (it) wouldn’t be a picnic. I wouldn’t say it was humane. I think we can do a lot better,” she said.

“I think we can do a lot better. In a situation like this, if we have a different way of doing something (where) it won’t harm anything else, then let’s be smart and take that alternative. Why would we use a poison that could potentially kill other things when that’s not the target? It makes no sense.”

Eirich pointed out that this poison is approved by the federal Pest Management Regulatory Agency.

However, Dell thinks, if the city has to continue with gopher extermination, it should switch to carbon monoxide cartridges that are commonly used on golf courses.

She believes it’s important to take more steps to protect animals that play an important role in the ecosystem.

“I think people are really happy to have owls in the neighbourhood that are good rodent control, and the hawks. I know not everyone loves crows and magpies, but it’s all part of nature.”