Parks Canada spent over $10,000 culling an American bullfrog population, yet only caught one in the four years the program operated.
Through access to information documents acquired by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, the advocacy group found that thousands of taxpayer dollars were spent on an operation that killed only one frog at a national park in British Columbia over four years in its bid to eliminate an invasive species.
According to the documents, Parks Canada spent $10,009 at Gulf Islands National Park Reserve to euthanize the American bullfrog between 2018 and 2023, and only one frog was killed.
The park is a nature reserve “teeming with wildlife” located on the Gulf Islands in B.C.
The documents clarify that the goal of culling a species on the list is to manage the population of overabundant and often invasive species.
According to the Canadian Encyclopedia, the American bullfrog is native to Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia, but it was introduced to B.C. and is now considered an invasive species in the province.
From 2019-2020, $2000 was spent exterminating the amphibians without finding a frog.
During the pandemic from 2020 to 2021, Parks Canada took a break from hunting the invasive American bullfrog, opting not to spend any taxpayer dollars on the hunt.
As the documents obtained by the CTF show, in 2021-2022, Parks Canada resumed the frog hunt, spending $2,202.27, but the elusive leapers again escaped their grasp.
Finally, between 2022 and 2023, Parks Canada increased the funding towards its American Bullfrog Euthanization program to $3,882.04, and a single American Bullfrog was captured.
“Kids catch frogs for free, but Parks Canada managed to spend several years and thousands of tax dollars before it even managed to catch one frog,” the CTF’s B.C. director Carson Binda said in the report. “Did Parks Canada put Wile E. Coyote in charge of this operation?”
However, in 2023-2024, $5079.54 was spent, and the park was able to eliminate 100 American Bullfrogs from the island reserve.
According to the CTF the frogs killed by Parks Canada “come at a hit to taxpayers of $149 a head.”
“The frogs appear to be slipping through the fingers of Parks Canada bureaucrats just as fast as our hard-earned tax dollars are,” Binda said. “Parks Canada keeps proving it’s horrible at hunting, but great at wasting taxpayer money.”
Parks Canada did not reply to True North’s request to comment before the deadline provided.
