Birdies Unwelcome at Golf Course : Environment: City brings out the shotguns in annual effort to eradicate troublesome coots at River Ridge links in Oxnard.

Shotgun fire shattered the normally placid environs of the River Ridge Golf Course on Tuesday morning as Oxnard officials began their annual attempt to eradicate migratory coots from the course.

Nearby, about a dozen animal rights activists gathered to protest, waving placards and shouting as city workers prepared to take aim at the slate-colored birds.

Officials at the city-owned facility say that each year the small, duck-like birds--also known as mud hens--descend on the course, making parts of it unplayable because the birds root for worms and cover some of the finely manicured greens with droppings.

City of Oxnard workers firing on the birds with live ammunition and blanks were briefly delayed when an animal rights activist boarded a small inflatable raft and rowed to the center of an artificial lake that surrounds the 14th green.

Lorna Casey of Granada Hills rowed back to shore after hearing that the shooters were beginning to use live rounds near artificial lakes by holes No. 11 and No. 12. Although she was neither arrested nor cited, Oxnard police said she was guilty of trespassing and referred the case to the Ventura County district attorney’s office for review.

City workers have been trying to eradicate the coots since the course opened in 1987, resorting in recent years to shooting the birds.

Casey said she also protested the practice last year, when she grabbed a shotgun from one of the city workers.

“I think what’s happening here is a cruel practice and is one that should be stopped,” said Casey, whose mother lives near the course. “I didn’t know what they were going to do with me out in the boat to tell you the truth--I just hoped to stop the killings.”

Although Casey’s protest brought the eradication effort to a temporary standstill on the 14th hole, city workers killed about 30 coots elsewhere on the course. Later in the morning, the shooters returned to the 14th hole, shooting blanks, or “cracker shells,” near the birds, which would temporarily take flight, then settle back on the fairway a few minutes later.

Using deadly force against the birds was the city’s final option in dealing with the birds, said Michael Henderson, the city’s superintendent of parks and facilities.

“It seems that if a few aren’t killed they don’t take the hint,” Henderson said, adding that during a single migrating season--September through April--as many as 10,000 coots may stop off at the course.

“Believe me, this is not something we want to do, but feel we have to do,” Henderson said. “At this point, we have tried just about everything there is to try, short of shooting them. Still, we plan on shooting as few of them as possible. “

Henderson said the city has a U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife permit to shoot as many as 400 of the birds.

During Casey’s waterborne protest, about a dozen other animal rights activists decried the operation.

“The city is acting like barbarians,” said Harry Naughton, an observer for the Ventura County Humane Society. “There has to be an alternative other than just shooting them.”

Echoing Naughton was Dorothy Done, a spokeswoman for the Ventura County chapter of the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

“It’s ironic that the city’s own logo has a bird in it and yet they are here doing this,” Done said. “I think that they should cease this shooting and rethink how to handle this problem. We would be glad to help them.”