“It reeks.” “It’s disgusting and disgraceful.”
These are reactions from area residents all too familiar with what is rotting at the entry to a roadway in Miscampbell.
Deer and moose carcasses—including their severed heads, limbs, skeletons, and other debris—pile up at the turn-off to “Blueberry Mike’s” road on Frog Creek Road between Lots No. 4 and 5 in Concession No. 1 every year when area hunters dump off the butchered remains of their quarry.
Winter makes one forget it’s there, but come spring everything melts—exposing the decomposing heaps that also fill the side ditches at the road opening, where spring run-off flows through it and on down the chain.
However, it’s nothing new. The decaying mess has been an ongoing problem in that spot for years.
Complaints are nothing new, either. Yet it seems no one really knows what to do about it—and subsequently nothing ever gets done.
When it comes down to brass tacks, it’s always been about catching the culprits who dump the carcasses there.
And being that the land adjacent to Blueberry Mike’s road is private, it’s up to the landowners to do the stake-out and report the incident to police as a “trespass to property” violation, said Dave Saunders, enforcement supervisor with the Ministry of Natural Resources here.
Because it is a private land issue, the MNR has no jurisdiction there to stop it—unless the trespass action involves illegal hunting or fishing.
“I’ve been here 20 years and it’s been a problem all this time,” Saunders noted yesterday.
“It started out as a nice, close spot to town where hunters would drop off their animal bones,” he said. “We used to get [complaint calls] from people that these were illegally-killed animals being butchered there.
“That’s not what it is, but it has now become a dump.”
Drew Stajkowski, a senior environmental officer with the Ministry of the Environment in Kenora, was asked about the MoE’s role in nixing chronic waste disposal on this particular road.
After further talks with Ministry of Transportation and Ministry of Natural Resources officials late last week, Stajkowski said Thursday his next step included a trip to the Lands and Titles office.
“If we can determine who it is that is disposing of waste there, then we would ask them to clean it up. And if we cannot determine [that], then the owner of the land is liable and required to remove it,” he remarked, citing landowner responsibilities under the Environmental Protection Act.
“It has yet to be determined who actually owns that road and the property adjacent to the road, but it is not necessarily Crown land.
“But I have to get to the bottom of that before any further action is taken,” he stressed.
Stajkowski confirmed that if the road is adjacent to private land, the MNR (which is in charge of Crown land) has no responsibility to clean up the mess.
Equally, if the road is used for access to private lands, it can’t be gated or restricted by means of a berm, etc. by Miscampbell’s local services board.
In fact, the road in question was taken off the road maintenance and repairs list by the Miscampbell roads board due to limited funding sometime prior to June, 2003.
Meanwhile, MTO regional director Larry Lambert responded to questions about accountability for the animal dumping ground through an e-mail to the Times from his Thunder Bay office.
“Normally, responsibility for garbage/litter removal in unorganized areas is conducted by a Local Services Board. In this area, no LSB exists,” wrote Lambert.
“The matter of garbage/litter removal has been discussed with the LSB trustees [and] since the road is largely overgrown and only serves as an access to undeveloped patented lots, they have chosen to spend none of their limited funds on any aspect of this particular road,” he concluded.
The Fort Frances Public Works department confirmed deer and moose carcasses can be disposed of by town residents during hunting season at the local landfill off McIrvine Road but tipping fees (a minimum of $12) do apply.
Fort Frances Times
Local News from Across the Rainy River District
