Foul Play Feared in Bird Deaths

It’s mating season for the colorful peafowl of Palos Verdes Estates. But instead of advancing the species, some of the exotic birds are turning up dead.

Five lifeless birds have been discovered in the city since Jan. 23, and no one has been able to figure out who or what is killing them.

Laboratory tests have ruled out disease, and residents who have found the dead birds said they don’t appear to have any physical injuries.

What everyone does know is that peafowl have always been a polarizing issue on this wealthy peninsula with its breathtaking views of the Pacific Ocean. Residents filed a lawsuit several years ago, saying the peacocks and peahens created an unbearable nuisance with their high-pitched shrieks and destructive ways.

Locals have rounded some of them up and shipped them to other, more peafowl-friendly communities. Others have assumed a grin-and-bear it attitude toward the birds, which number about 60 in two residential neighborhoods.

But even anti-peafowl residents say this latest turn goes too far.

“This is really going over the line,” said Bill Goldman, one of 18 residents who sued the city over the birds. “It’s not acceptable.”

Goldman and his like-minded neighbors would like the city to trap all the roaming peafowl and relocate them. One woman even suggested the city set up an aviary in the downtown village as a sort of tourist attraction.

A judge agreed with the anti-fowl contingent that the city’s policy of allowing the birds to roam violates a 1928 deed restriction that prohibits domestic animals in the city except for dogs and cats. The city has appealed the ruling. Meantime, some think someone may be taking avian justice into their own hands.

“It could be poison, it could be a shooting, it could be they’re eating something wrong,” said Capt. Mark Velez of the Palos Verdes Estates Police Department, who heads the city’s peafowl management program. “It just looks suspicious that so many died in such a short period of time in such a confined location.

“I would like to believe that it’s just something in nature, because I don’t want to believe someone would intentionally hurt animals. But there’s a big possibility that somebody’s killing them on purpose,” Velez said.

So far, there are no suspects.

Legend has it the first peacocks were bought to the peninsula in 1923 as a gift from someone who thought the place was too quiet. Their numbers have spread to the three other upscale peninsula cities of Rolling Hills, Rolling Hills Estates and Rancho Palos Verdes.

The deaths in Palos Verdes Estates come at an inauspicious time, as the city prepares to file court documents in support of its appeal, said Debbie Mott, a 16-year resident and president of Friends of the Peacock, an organization that formed in response to the lawsuit.

“It’s suspicious, especially because the birds showed no signs of physical injury, no mangled feathers or blood,” said Mott, whose husband found the first two dead birds last month while walking their two dogs.

Friends of the Peacock has offered a $1,000 reward for information leading to the conviction of anyone for killing the birds.

Lab tests paid for by the group and released Thursday ruled out avian disease as a cause of death, she said. The lab will next test for toxins and poisons.

Lloyd and Peggy Menveg, both 82, said they’ve never had a problem with the birds in 35 years. The Menvegs buy 100 pounds of corn a month to feed the peafowl each day at about sunset. Some eat from Peggy Menveg’s hand. Cars line up and neighbors bring their children to watch the spectacle, the couple said.

“It’s almost a tourist attraction,” Lloyd Menveg said.

But an attraction for some can be a detraction for others.

Mary Ann Evans, 75, and her husband, David, 86, built a backyard play area under a pine tree for their grandchildren. But peafowl roosting in the tree left so many droppings and did so much squawking that the children never used it, they said.

So the Evans spent $1,500 to remove the tree a few years ago.

“I love birds,” David Evans said. “I feed the song birds, I feed the hummingbirds, but these birds are destructive. They don’t belong in a residential area.”

Goldman said the birds’ screeches, which some liken to a woman’s screams, keep him and his wife up at night. Now that it’s bird mating season, the nightly calls are especially loud and persistent.

“They wake us up every 20 minutes,” he said. “It’s like having farm animals in your backyard.”