OXNARD : Animal Activists Blast Coot Shootings

Coot-shooting season has resumed at River Ridge Golf Club, and animal lovers this week fired a few verbal shots at golf course officials.

Camarillo resident Kim Turnbull said she saw golf course employees shoot sea gulls and coots at the Oxnard course Monday in violation of a federal permit.

And Lee Casey, whose daughter Lorna protested the shooting last year by rowing an inflatable raft to the center of one of the lakes, said she fled her house during Monday’s shooting, in which 35 coots were killed. Casey’s house borders the golf course.

“I just go all to pieces and get hysterical,” Casey said. “You can’t imagine how loud and horrible it is.”

City Parks Supt. Michael Henderson confirmed that a sea gull had been shot Monday because it was injured and could not fly.

But Henderson said the bird might have been injured before the coot eradication effort since a plastic six-pack fastener was found attached to its legs. He acknowledged that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service permit that allows officials to kill 300 coots through March 31 prohibits shooting sea gulls.

Golf course manager Otto Kanny said employees of High Tide & Green Grass Inc., the company that maintains River Ridge for the city of Oxnard, have been shooting coots from 8:30 to 10 a.m. on Mondays since October.

Kanny said other methods to discourage coots from congregating on the course have not worked. Those efforts have included harassing the birds by exploding “scare shells,” using scarecrows, dogs, remote-control airplanes and spraying their hangouts with pepper spray.

Kanny said coots nibble grass to its roots, and their droppings burn patches in the turf and foster algae in the artificial lakes.

The Humane Society has been notified about the coot shoots. Society President Joyce George said all the organization can do is monitor the shooting to make sure golf course employees don’t exceed the federal quota.

“It’s a very unfortunate thing but the shooting is legal within city limits,” George said. “It’s so frustrating for us as an agency, because it’s so morally wrong to shoot these.”