Squirrels versus golfers in Palo Alto

[Guest guest]

Thursday's Palo Alto Daily News featured an interesting front page article

headlined " City kills squirrels for safety, " reporting Palo Alto's plans to

kill squirrels at its municipal golf course via trapping and poisoning. It

is also worth noting that Palo Alto is considering adopting non-lethal

alternatives instead.

 

The article is pasted below. Forgive the formatting; I had to cut and paste

from a PDF file. The PDF file of the full Thursday paper is available at

http://www.paloaltodailynews.com/dailynews/PADN/2004/08/PA_20040819.htm.

 

Guidelines for letters to the editor are at:

http://www.paloaltodailynews.com/dailynews/http/letters.html

 

Send letters to news and put " letter " in the subject

line.

 

-Matthew

 

 

 

 

City kills squirrels for safety

 

BY RANDY JENSEN

DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

 

Using pesticides, traps and a covered

wall, Palo Alto is trying to control

a population explosion of ground

squirrels at the municipal golf course.

Because the ground squirrels are

creating a “serious safety problem,”

for golfers who may step into one of

the thousands of holes in the ground

on the 18-hole course, the city is trying

to control the population.

Parks and Golf Director Paul

Diaz said the city is using rodent

bait and traps to kill the squirrels,

which have exploded into the thousands.

He said the city is trying to maintain

the population at a manageable

level.

In an effort to reduce the use of

pesticides and harm to “non-target”

animals, the city is testing a control

method that covers bordering fences.

Since the squirrels prefer living in

places with low grass and broad

views that although them to spot

predators, the covered fences are

meant to get the squirrels to move

See SQUIRRELS page 59

off the 106-acre course by limiting

their line of site.

Right now one fence is covered,

and if it is successful other fences

would be blanketed. Dias said the

cost of the programs has not been

cheap, but he could not provide a

number.

Palo Alto Wildlife expert Deborah

Bartens said city officials have

been monitoring the situation very

closely are trying to use methods of

killing the squirrels that would have

the least impact on other species.

She said if someone was to step

into one of the large holes created

by the squirrels they could twist an

ankle or suffer other injuries.

Department of Fish and Game

spokesman Steve Martarano said

killing squirrels is not regulated by

the agency and would be up to the

individual city.

According to Palo Alto municipal

code, “If it unlawful for any person,

by any means, to slaughter any

dog, cat, sheep, goat, pig, cow,

horse, deer, raccoon, coyote, mountain

lion, llama, mule, squirrel or

opossum within the city.”

Exceptions to the section are for

putting sick, injured or unwanted

pets or animals to sleep, or for a

police officer to kill an animal that

is considered dangerous or badly

injured.

Violation of this section is a

misdemeanor.

The current Palo Alto situation

seems to mirror a similar problem

that Stanford University had in

1997. It had to begin killing

ground squirrels that were threatening

palm trees on campus.

Following protests, the university

switched to a more humane

method of killing the squirrels that

was not supposed to impact other

species that were living in the

area.