9) FOUR-LEGGED FRIENDS NEED LOVE TOO Once again, the squirrels in Palisades Park took center stage as residents protested City Hall’s hunting of the furry critters. It wasn’t the city’s fault that the squirrel population on the bluffs was cut. Los Angeles County officials forced Santa Monica to hire a squirrel hunter out of fear that there were too many breeding, creating the potential for Bubonic Plague to spread. The fear has never been realized and probably never will considering the fleas living on the squirrel’s backs need to be in a certain altitude for the plague to come into effect, an altitude that could never be reached in Santa Monica.
Ducks got some love this year, too. Residents living near Douglas Park called into the Daily Press in May out of concern for the fluffy quackers after seeing city staff draining the ponds at the park. Many mother ducks had just given birth and were depending on the ponds for sustenance.
However, city staff needed to drain the putrid bodies of water because the ducks apparently didn’t learn the lesson that you should never defecate where you eat. Every year, just before summer, City Hall is forced to drained the ponds at Douglas Park so that they can be cleaned of the fowl’s fecal matter, which causes nitrogen levels in the water to rise and promote algae growth that starves the water of oxygen. This kills the goldfish, mosquito eaters and other fish City Hall releases into the ponds, not to mention plant life.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on December 30, 2006. Read the original PDF.