A few weeks ago, a few members of my family – several cousins and an uncle from the U.S. – gathered at a rented cottage up north. Between cloud bursts and wind gusts, we attempted to holiday. We threw a few horseshoes. We got some summer reading in on the deck. We attempted a couple of barbeques. We even approximated some swimming. During one of those warm spells, my cousin’s husband made an announcement.
“I’m off to dig up earth worms,” Jerry said, “and I’m going to do some fishing.”
“Go to it, Jerr,” we all said.
It was only when we noticed him at the end of the dock with a bucket of worms, his fishing rod and a handful of lures that we wondered whether there was something rather important missing: A fishing licence. Frankly, we didn’t know whether one was needed for casting baited hooks off a pier on a lake from a rented cottage, or not. But we warned him to keep an eye out, just in case an Ontario conservation officer happened by. I didn’t want my innocent relative from Florida suddenly running afoul of the law, losing his car or ending up in the slammer just for playing-fishing off a dock.
“Are there that many conservation officers around?” he retorted.
Particularly in the wake of events this past week, I guess my family illustrated the epidemic sweeping Ontario’s vacation spots this summer. The public is horribly ignorant of what’s the law. What’s worse, we’re not even practising common sense by the water’s edge.
Take for example a few of the recent cases of drownings in cottage country – as of this writing, I think, nine people have lost their lives in swimming, boating and waterskiing accidents in the last 10 or 11 days. Doubly tragic is that most of them were preventable. In other words, if those people had worn life jackets (not just stacked them in the boat), not gone boating under-the-influence, or checked with local residents about the high water levels this year, some of those nine individuals might be alive today.
It would be easy to blame youth for the false sense of invincibility and associated cockiness out in the water. But it’s not fair and it’s not accurate. Three of the nine people who died in this spate of drownings were between 40 and 55 years of age, several more in their 30s, the rest 20-somethings. And to be perfectly honest, when our men’s canoe group hits the water each April, to take on the Black River current in flood, we mostly just wear life jackets when we enter rapids or bad weather; the rest of the time our preservers are preserving nothing but an empty space in the canoe bottom. Not too smart for a bunch of guys with so-called life experience.
Not to be outdone by those forgetting common sense in the water this summer, there’s the nutty group that decided to illustrate their ignorance and lawlessness on the water. The case of the three prairie hunters who conducted target practice on a bunch of out-of-season ducks on a western lake or pond has just come down to a conviction. According to a Saskatchewan court ruling, the three took pot shots at ducks and ducklings just to witness the carnage. What’s more they video-taped it and put it on YouTube.
“Did you get the baby?” calls out one of the hunters.
Another is heard shouting it’s “a massacre!”
Meanwhile, the judge in the case called the entire escapade, “stupid, reckless and irresponsible,” and he could fine the threesome $100,000 under provincial law and $300,000 under federal law – not to mention throw them in jail for six months. I don’t mind telling you that the YouTube video turned my stomach. Not surprisingly regional conservationists, the Wildlife Federation, Environment Canada and even the hunting fraternity are all outraged at these men’s antics too.
But here’s perhaps the most alarming aspect of the entire incident: if the egotistical hunters hadn’t used social media to show off, it’s unlikely that any conservation officers would have brought them to justice. The truth is – with general cutbacks over the years – that there are not nearly enough conservation officers around to catch lawbreakers in or on the water.
The Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources (on its website) indicates that the department has more 250,000 lakes to supervise; and there are but 273 COs to cover a million square kilometres of Ontario back country.
That’s why my cousin Jerry, casting baited hooks off the end of the dock in cottage country for perch and bass, probably had nothing to worry about. Still, ignorance may be bliss, but it’s no excuse.
