Over the past few decades, the number of Canadian geese that have permanently migrated (they don’t go home, even in the summer) to the lower 48, even as far as Texas, has increased dramatically. They are very acclimated to humans and when they are in large groups they are a nuisance. My girls know to look out for “goose-poop” when walking pretty much anywhere. They have been the cause of numerous accidents in my area, as they will saunter out into the road with nary a care, causing motorists to slam on their brakes.
In the middle of the last century, the populations of these animals was much smaller, and conservationists (here in the US and Canada) went to great lengths to preserve the population and grow it…well they have exceeded expectations.
While they are beautiful animals in flight, down on the ground amongst us humans they are pests, constantly begging for food from the patio restaurants, etc.
Catch 'em, kill 'em, eat 'em, throw 'em in the garbage, I don’t care. I just want about 80% of them gone so they’ll stop shitting on everything. They’re a menace.
Yes! A couple of them tried to run me off the bike trail last weekend. A few years ago, a herd blocked the door to my work, hissing and running at anyone who tried to get to the door. Of course, the folks that feed them every day would have been horrified if anyone had touched one of the poor babies.
If dogs ran loose and chased bicycles the county would do something about it, I hope, so why not geese?
They tend to come from Canada, migrate south to get fat and happy, then migrate north again for sexy time. In recent times, more and more of them couldn’t be arsed to make the trip back north.
Just a guess, but 75 years ago, where I live now was deserted of people and houses. I understand it was a prime hunting spot for all kinds of shore birds, and there were very few laws prohibiting hunting them. You could bag a freezer full of birds by hanging out on the shore for a day with some friends.
Now days, the birds are relatively protected from hunters. Limited legal hunting seasons, limited areas to hunt. Homeowners are more likely to feed them than kill them. Could this be a factor in their population explosion?
I used to work in building and grounds maintenance. We got a permit from the Fish and Wildlife Service and the state DNR to “addle” the eggs in the nests around our buildings. Basically two people would try to distract the parents while the third painted the eggs with corn oil. The chicks inside will suffocate and the goose won’t lay a second set of eggs like she would if you stole or smashed the eggs.
It was relatively easy for us to get the permission, just had to prove they were a “nuisance”.
I wish more property owners were aware of that option.
In Ontario, the big thing is for one municipality to relocate the shit-blimps to another municipality, so that the birds don’t get hurt and the politicians can say that they are actively removing the birds. Of course all it does is pass the problem on to other municipalities.
One of the more interesting relocation techniques is to have an on-water goose round-up using canoeists. The canoeists drive goslings that cannot yet fly toward shore where a corral is in place. The goslings enter the corral, and their parents follow them. Once in the corral, they are then herded into a cube van for delivery to some other poor bastards bailiwick. Although the adult birds can fly, they prefer to stay with their goslings.
Excerpted from Environment Canada’s FAQ: •Are Canada Geese protected and can they be hunted?
Yes, Canada Geese are protected under the Migratory Birds Convention Act, 1994 (MBCA). This Act arose from an international treaty – the Migratory Birds Convention – between Canada and the United States, signed in 1916. The MBCA provides for the protection and conservation of migratory birds, and prohibits people from harming birds, except under specified conditions. Several species, including Canada geese, are considered game birds and may be hunted. The Act gives the federal government the responsibility to establish hunting seasons, and Canada Geese are greatly appreciated by migratory game bird hunters across the country. More than 500 000 Canada Geese are taken in Canada each year by hunters.
. . . .
•How many Canada Geese were present historically?
Canada Geese nested historically in some parts of southern Canada, particularly in open grassland areas with wetlands. These habitats in south-western Ontario and the southern Prairies supported breeding populations of Canada Geese at the time of settlement, although it is not known how many birds were present then. There is much more food and suitable habitat available now as a result of human activities on the landscape (e.g., large scale agricultural production of cereal grains), so it is likely that there were markedly fewer Canada Geese than are present today, even in areas where they occurred naturally. This landscape change also benefits the Canada Geese that nest in sub-arctic regions. Further, in other parts of the country, Canada Geese are not native and are present only as a result of intentional introductions by humans. Both introduced (southern BC, Québec, Maritime provinces) and indigenous (southern Prairie Provinces, southern Ontario) populations have grown at an extraordinary rate to the point where they are causing unacceptable damage and danger in local areas.
. . . .
•Why have Canada Goose populations grown so much?
The extraordinary growth of Canada Geese, like that of many species of geese, has occurred because of their adaptability to environments that have been heavily influenced by human populations. In southern Canada, Canada Geese live in mild climates with abundant wetland and grassland habitats, and few natural predators. Many gravitate to suburban and urban areas where they are not only protected from predators, but also are safe from hunting. On top of this, sources of food are more abundant and of higher nutritional value than in the past, primarily due to the expansion of agricultural activities on the land, and the adaptation by geese to foraging in these environments. This combination of factors contributes to consistently high annual production of young birds and increases their ability to survive from year to year. The unprecedented abundance of high quality food on the landscape also benefits geese that breed in northern Canada by allowing them to survive in greater numbers over winter and more easily accumulate reserves needed for egg-laying.
I’d be happy it was just illegal to feed the things. Part of the reason they are such a problem at my work is because people bring food for them when the chicks are young (Awww, so cute) then the next year there are 5 times as many.
They’re horrible. They’ve ruined the park in the middle of town. You can’t even play frisbee because there is goose poop everywhere. There is goose poop up and down the sidewalks for blocks away from the park. They make things harder for the ducks in the pond. They are disgusting pests and they are aggressive.
They’re an invasive species in this area (NJ) and we should have no compunction about exterminating them.
If you did it in the spring when the goslings were small, it shouldn’t be too difficult. All the half-assed measures that people have taken have proven ineffective. Addling the eggs only takes care of that one nest. Hiring dogs to chase them away is stupid because they come back (especially if the next guy hires dogs to chase them away from wherever they went).
Hm…I just reviewed a goose control contract that covers 16 commercial office buildings in NJ and Westchester County. Each building pays an average of $5,500 a year for the dogs! I hate to see a bunch of border collies rendered jobless, but spending all this money to chase flocks of geese around the tri-state area absurd. $5,500 per year could buy a lot of exterminating.
Which brings up the question - why aren’t we exterminating them already?
ETA: Based on Muffin’s post - the MBCA could (and should) be changed to allow this.
"We think the geese have a right to be where they are. They have just as much a right to be here as the people who use the beach,‘’ said Dr. Wayne Johnson of the Northwest Animal Rights Network. “We do not think Canada geese should have to pay with their life because of fecal matter”
[…]
Wildlife officers working for the Wildlife Services division of the U.S. Department of Agriculture captured Canada geese in Seattle city parks, put them in specially designed trucks, and gassed them to death. The officials had been asked to do this by an intergovernmental agency, the Seattle Waterfowl Management Committee (SWMC), established in 1987 to address problems associated with ever-expanding local populations of Canada geese.
The killings continued through the summer, when neither adults nor their offspring can fly and when the birds are most obvious, hanging around and pooping in parks. By the end of the year 2000, agents had killed 3,500 birds around Puget Sound. It was considered such a success that federal agents killed 4,200 additional birds in 2001.
Now, about those god-damned crows…