A group of St. Clements-area farmers say they are at their wits end after seeing crops repeatedly damaged by off-road vehicles.
“It makes you want to quit,” said Ron Petaski. “Unless someone takes action, they’re just going to keep it up.”
“They had a road through my field,” he said.
At one point he chased down two young people, took pictures of them, and “tried to get them to realize what they were doing.” The kids agreed to leave the field alone and stick to grass trails between the fields.
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“The minute my back was turned, they and their friends were back,” he said.
Why it matters: Farmers in the area say they’ve tried repeatedly to have the situation resolved, to no avail.
He filed a police report, and thanks to a phone number on the side of one of the quads, police traced it to one of the kids’ grandfathers. The grandfather promised to keep the kids off the field, but the ATVs returned.
“I guess if the police don’t want to get involved, there’s not much we can do,” he said. “They told me I just have to sit back and watch… if I chased them and someone got hurt, then I would be charged.”
Manitoba RCMP told the Co-operator that no charges had been laid in this situation and that no further damages had been reported to them. Police spoke to the people involved, said RCMP spokesperson Tara Seel.
“In no instance would we expect someone to ‘sit back and take the damage,’” said Seel. “We encourage anyone who has been a victim to come forward to police.”
Jim Petaski, who farms nearby, said a truck went joyriding across two of his fields.
“They weren’t crossing the field to get anywhere. They were zig-zagging and doing power turns,” he said. “They were deliberately damaging my crop.”
He estimated several thousand dollars of damage.
“There’s no recovery of that,” he said.
Jim Petaski said he filed a report with police. He’d taken pictures of tire tracks and identified where the vehicle had entered and left the field but had not seen the culprits.
He said RCMP didn’t seem all that interested to spend time on his case.
“Nothing seems to be done,” he said.
Neighbour John Van Aert said off-road vehicles have left a five or six-foot “roadway” about 20 feet into his field along a road allowance.
Fritz Aldinger, who also farms in that area, said off-road vehicles drove across his field shortly after it was seeded.
In some quarter-mile stretches of field he’s seen 30 or 40 different tracks, said Aldinger.
“You name it we’ve pretty well had it,” said Aldinger. “I don’t know hardly a neighbour in my community that doesn’t have all kinds of stories of chasing these riders off their fields.”
ATV riders are a fire hazard in these dry conditions, he added.
The RCMP told the Co-operator that posting signage in “highly visible areas” is advised, as is incorporating fencing and putting up security cameras where feasible.
Van Aert said he’s had success in deterring riders by putting up signage. Other times the off-roaders drive over them or the signs disappear.
Jim Petaski said he’s put up cable gates across his field accesses and put up no-trespassing signs.
“That did not help anything and it did not deter anything,” he said. “They drive through the ditches and they drive over the signs.”
The farmers have gone to the Municipality of St. Clements to ask for help. Ideally, the RM would also put up official signage warning off-road vehicles, said Jim Petaski.
“Something’s got to be done because we’re at our wits end with this.”
All four farmers agreed the incidents are happening more frequently. Jim and Ron Petaski said it may be related to a new subdivision nearby. Kids there don’t have many options for riding unless they’re hauling their ATVs elsewhere, said Jim Petaski.
Aldinger said he’s tracked down drivers’ parents only to have the parents back up their kids.
A neighbour confronted some teenage dirt-bikers. “They pretty quickly told him he could shove it up his you-know-what,” said Aldinger.
A few nights later the neighbour’s house windows were smashed. The man found dirt-bike tracks leaving his yard, Aldinger said.
The RM is aware of the damage ATVs are causing, said chief administrative officer Deepak Joshi in a statement emailed to the Co-operator.
It has “tried to address the issue through education and communication on our website and our monthly newsletters,” said Joshi. This has included warnings not to ride on privately owned or leased land without permission.
Enforcement is the RCMP’s jurisdiction, Joshi added.
Joshi said the mayor of St. Clements intends to bring up the issue at the next council meeting to see what, if anything, council can do.
Earlier this year the province passed Bill 63 amending the Petty Trespass Act and the Occupiers’ Liability Act.
The amendments removed the landowner’s responsibility to confront trespassers if the property is marked or partially enclosed to keep people off, or if that property falls into a category of property that would not normally be available to the public.
The bill also amended the Occupiers’ Liability Act, which states that a landowner or occupier has a limited duty of care to someone driving off-road vehicles or using recreational trails.
Under the amendments, the limited duty of care is extended to anyone 12 years or older who comes onto the property to commit a criminal act, or comes onto property that is not usually available for public use, such as agricultural land.
These amendments await proclamation to become law.
