Workers Who Fed Squirrels Upset by Poisoning of Rodent Colony

For years, the women working at S.Cargo, a Woodland Hills clothing store, greeted the squirrels living on a nearby hillside with offerings of peanuts, broccoli and carrots, often laughing at Orson, an ornery, fat squirrel that tried to hog all the food.

But Orson’s feeders fear that he--and much of his colony--have died in an unnecessarily cruel fashion after eating cobalt blue oats laced with poison spread by county agriculture department workers three weeks ago. And the ensuing controversy has become something of a cause celebre for employees at S.Cargo, which sells hand-painted clothes at the Woodland Plaza Shopping Center.

“There’s no place for wildlife to live,” complained Laura Powers, an S.Cargo artist. “It’s OK to develop land that other creatures live in, kick them out and eradicate them. No one would think about the fact that the place has already been lived in for generations.”

Dozens of squirrels have died in their burrows on a hill behind the mini-mall after the county Health Services Department ordered them killed to control the colony’s population, lessen hillside erosion and reduce chances of an outbreak of bubonic plague, which can be spread by fleas from infected squirrels.

Officials said diphacinone, an EPA-approved pesticide, does not kill other wildlife and humans unless eaten in large quantities. The anticoagulant dilutes the blood so that it seeps out, and squirrels bleed to death after two to three feedings and within a couple of days.

Most of the squirrels have crawled back into the burrows to die, but some have been found stumbling or dead in the alley bordering the hill, leaving traces of blood behind them.

Richard Wightman, deputy agricultural commissioner, said the county tries to get rid of the squirrels from about 100 sites each year for land development, erosion problems and disease control. The rodents behind the shopping center posed a problem even about 10 years ago, when the county tried to cut down the colony’s size.

Poisoning the squirrels was safer than using gas or shooting them, options that were also considered, Wightman said. And he maintained that diphacinone does not cause the rodents much pain.

“It’s a lot like if you have a cut and there’s blood; you have a sensation of weakness,” he said, adding that humans only encourage overpopulation by leaving food out for the squirrels.

Veterinarian William Gregory, who operates an animal hospital at the shopping center, said diphacinone causes a “less traumatic” death for the squirrels than other poisons. The squirrels’ ability to feel pain weakens because of poor blood circulation, he said.

There is a debate over who actually instigated the killing of the squirrels. The health department said it was contacted by the shopping center’s management. But Ellie Antonio, a director at Tandem Management Co., denied notifying county authorities and said the company had to pay $1,500 for the rodents’ eradication.

The colony’s demise has deeply affected the women at S.Cargo. After discovering the squirrels’ fate, they spent hours calling wildlife groups and state agencies seeking information about the poison and its effects on other wildlife. They also complained to the center’s managers.

“It feels like a nuclear waste place,” said S.Cargo manager Gerre Scherz about the hill, where now only an occasional squirrel is seen.

Scherz and her co-workers used to feed the squirrels breakfast and even named the critters: Punker the scrawny one; Little Susie the timid one; Fat Albert, the leader; and Orson, whose size reminded them of actor Orson Welles.

Now the workers lunch inside and close the back door to shut out the oat-dotted hill.

“What do the live ones do when their tunnels are stuffed with dead bodies?” asked Powers, who wrote a letter to The Times eulogizing the dead animals. “Will any of the live ones rejuvenate the colony?”

Like some of her colleagues, Powers has become a preservation activist. She wants to paint squirrels and other wild animals on T-shirts and donate part of the sales profits to preservation groups.

The squirrels’ deaths also have colored her attitude toward people, including a homeless veteran who hangs around the mall.

“At first, I just looked at him and thought ‘He looks ugly,’ ” Powers said. “Then I looked at him as a human creature who had been through a hell of ugly experiences. It’s made me think about a lot more than just living things. I just wonder what the future of all living things is.”