Sunshine Coast teen dies in hospital after toad-hunting golf club accident

A teenage boy has died in hospital after he was accidentally hit on the head with a golf club while hunting for cane toads with friends in Maroochydore on Saturday night.

Police believe Zeke Douglas, 13, was playing on the abandoned Hazeltine Court, which runs along one boundary of the former Horton Park Golf Course site, when a friend accidentally struck him on the back of the head around 7.30pm.

Zeke’s friends frantically performed CPR until paramedics rushed the high-school student to Nambour Hospital.

He was flown to Brisbane's Lady Cilento Children's Hospital, in a critical condition where he later died.

Police said Zeke’s injury appeared to be a tragic accident and there are no suspicious circumstances.

Earlier, the grandmother of one of the boy's mates said the injured teen's mother was devastated.

"She called my grandson yesterday and she was absolutely distraught," the woman, who didn't want to be named, told The Courier-Mail.

"We are all pretty shocked."

The RSPCA has repeatedly appealed to Queenslanders intent on killing cane toads not to hit them with golf clubs or cricket bats, saying such methods rarely kill the pests.

It says cane toads should be killed humanely by putting them to sleep in the fridge, before freezing them.