Problem Wildlife
Beaver Control
Big Lakes County controls beaver dams that threaten the integrity of municipal infrastructure. This includes culverts, roads, and licensed drainage ditches. If the dam affecting municipal property is on privately held land, the municipality requires a release form to be signed, prior to dam removal proceeding. Please contact the Agricultural Services Manager at 780-523-5955 about beaver-related damage to county infrastructure.
Should beaver dams be causing ponding issues on private land that does not affect municipal infrastructure, landowners would need to seek the services of a beaver control professional at their own cost. Landowners are also encouraged to inquire about our ALUS program should they want to investigate alternative control measures such as beaver deceivers or pond levelers.
Wolf Hunting Incentive
Big Lakes County recognizes the need to support wolf population control efforts to reduce the incidents of livestock predation. To that end, the County created the Wolf Hunting Incentive. This incentive sees individuals harvesting a wolf being compensated by the municipality $250.00 per pelt (subject to change as per budget deliberations). This incentive is meant to promote the lawful hunting of wolves within the municipality.
The program is reviewed on a regular basis and includes all lands and residents within Big Lakes County, including the residents of Métis and First Nation settlements.
When requesting authorization for reward payment, the registrant must declare the following:
- That the wolf was harvested within an 8-kilometer (5 mile) perimeter of private property or grazing leases
- The legal land location where the wolf was harvested
- That they are the registered legal landowner or the authorized occupant of the land; and/or
- That the registrant has permission to hunt on said land
On a random basis, Agricultural Services will request confirmation of harvest site. To ease this requirement, Agricultural Services is instructing all participants to take a photo of the harvest site for our records with geolocating turned on in their smartphone. See the following instructions on how to turn on geolocating on your phone.
Turning on geolocating on your phone
- How to turn on / off GPS geotagging on iPhone and iPad
- Open iOS Settings App
- Tap on Privacy
- Select Location Services
- Tap on Camera
- In Allow location access select “While using the App” if you want photos to be geotagged or select “Never” if you do not want photos to be geotagged
- Scroll down to “Store Location in Pictures,” or “Geo-tag Photos,” depending on your OS version, and tap that option to put a green check mark next to it. Tap “OK” when you see a message telling you that the GPS function needs to be turned on. Your photos will now be geotagged with your location if your phone can get your position from the GPS satellites.
- Go to your Android device’s home screen, then press the “Menu” button. Tap “Settings” to access the settings menu.
- Drag your finger up the screen to scroll down the phone’s menu until you find the
- “Location” option. Tap the “Location” option to continue. Note that on some Android devices this may be labeled “Location and Security.”
- Tap the option labeled “Use GPS Satellites” to place a green check mark next to it. This option must be turned on for the geotagging option to work
- Press the “Home” button to go back to the main screen, then tap the camera icon to launch your Android smartphone’s camera.
- Tap the “Menu” button once the camera application loads, then tap the “Settings” option. On some Android cameras, this option will simply be a small cog icon
