By Sheila McLaughlin
The Cincinnati Enquirer

MADEIRA - Whitetail deer at Kenwood Country Club have an expensive appetite, and club officials are tired of footing the bill for it.

They've asked the city to relax its hunting ban, so they can get the job done.

Kraig Kanitz, chief operating officer, figures the deer are costing the club more than $10,000 a year to replace young trees and flowers, and to fix the torn-up greens and turf.

He said damage on the club's 356 acres and adjoining properties seems to have accelerated in the last year or two.

"They get bolder and bolder. They love to rub against the trees," Kanitz said Thursday

"Through the golf season, we had an awful lot of damage that my grounds crew had to constantly repair."

Kanitz recently wrote a letter to the city, asking that trained bow hunters be allowed to hunt the grounds, in an effort to reduce what he thinks is a growing herd.

Officials at Gate of Heaven Cemetery successfully lobbied Montgomery city council to do the same this fall, citing an increase in deer population, damage to landscaping, and missing flowers from graves.

Madeira council, however, isn't ready to give Kenwood County Club the OK just yet. City Manager Tom Moeller said they want the club officials to present independent proof that they have a deer problem.

"They would like the Ohio Department of Natural Resources or the county park district - some representative of someone - who can adequately evaluate whether or not there is in fact a deer problem," Moeller said.

State and park district officials have said they cannot estimate the deer population in Hamilton County, while statewide, the numbers have exploded, up 40 percent since 1998 to 575,000.

Moeller said people were illegally hunting the country club property until the city put a stop to it five or six years ago when neighbors complained of wayward arrows and injured deer on their property.

Kanitz said he isn't sure how hunting will be done at the club if Madeira allows it.

But, he said it would be tightly controlled.

Montgomery required selected hunters to obtain permits from police to hunt the property during Ohio's bow season, which runs Oct. 4 through Jan. 31.

"I just didn't want (city officials) to think I was going to strap a bow and arrow on my back and go out there in a three-piece suit and wing tips and shoot some deer," Kanitz said.

E-mail smclaughlin@enquirer.com