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Two hunters have pleaded guilty and have been fined a total of nearly $9,000 after a bull moose was found shot inside Ottawa’s Mer Bleue Bog in October 2024.
All hunting is strictly prohibited in the bog, which is located in the city’s greenbelt and is managed by the National Capital Commission.
According to a Friday release from Ontario’s Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR), two conservation officers patrolling the area by ATV on Oct. 8, 2024, found the two hunters in the bog.
They also found a hunting blind, a bait site and a bull moose that had been shot by one of the hunters that morning, the MNR said.
That hunter, who is from Rockland, Ont., was also holding another person’s bull moose tag. He pleaded guilty to that offence, the ministry said, as well as to hunting moose without a licence.
He’s been fined $7,500 and his licence has been suspended for one year.
“The bull moose was seized and donated so that the meat would not go to waste,” conservation officer Ron Arnold said in a video posted to X.
Loaded crossbow left unattended
The other hunter, who is from Ottawa, was hunting on a nearby property without carrying “the required landowner consent” and handling a firearm “without due care and attention,” according to the MNR release.
Specifically, that hunter left a fully loaded crossbow, unattended, outside of his ground blind, Arnold said.
“Unload your firearm when unattended. This is how we prevent accidents and keep everyone safe,” he said.
The Ottawa hunter pleaded guilty to using a firearm carelessly to hunt and to hunting moose on private land without carrying the required consent of the landowner.
He was fined $1,450, received a one-year hunting licence suspension and also needs to complete the Ontario Hunter Education Course, the ministry said.