I’m a vegetarian who agrees with “Kill them and eat them.” I wonder how many accidents are caused by people slipping on goose shit. And you cannot eat in the parks anymore. Those damn aggressive geese come up wanting what you are eating.
I hate them.
Being a Border Collie, I’m doing my part to keep 'em off airport runways. Go Piper!
I’ve no dog or goose in the fight, but wanted to share this alternative viewpoint that I read earlier this week:
Send them back! Send them back!
[sub]Sorry[/sub]
Shoot, shovel, then shut up.
I didn’t think it was possible, but that dog with the wrap-around shades manages to be adorable and badass at the same time.
I want to mock the above article, I really do, but the author called geese “sentient bird beings”. That already sounds like some out of a Discworld novel, how can I mock something that uses such silly terms in earnest?
My Grandfather loved roast goose, but he would only eat the white ones. He said Canada geese were muddy tasting, like catfish. I’ve never tried it, but I believed him. It may simply have been that the white ones were farmed though, and the Canada geese were wild, and hunted. I don’t like to eat any hunted game because they tend to be killed with lead shot. Call me crazy but I think that’s a bad idea, and may possibly explain a lot about American society.
I have eaten roasted white goose though, and likes it fine. A friend’s nephew brought them for Christmas one year.
I know in the US in the late 80’s there was a big societal push against eating geese because it was discovered that they mate for life. The hunting of geese therefore fell out of favor with a great many Americans.
I used goose fat to make pastry for Christmas pies a couple of years ago. And although it made fine tasting pies it was too melty to be convenient. I kept having to shove it all back into the freezer every five minutes. Ain’t nobody got time for that!
I love where the handler picks him up by the harness handle and loads him into the back seat like a missile. Did you catch Piper licking his chops at one point?
Like all geese and ducks, what they’ve been eating heavily influences how they taste. Canada geese like grass and grains and individuals that have been fattening up on wild rice will probably taste fine( if you like wild duck and geese generally ). A lot of folks really like them. However one that has been dredging the edges of a shallow pond for bugs and muddy weeds will taste a hell of a lot less inviting.
Years ago I worked in a office building that had MANY Poop Blimps living in the fire control ponds around the building. After I left, one very cold winter day, the sprinkler line over the corner office froze and broke, and the water from the ponds were pumped into the office.
I was happy I was elsewhere.
Why I like the Canada goose:
Both before and since the cackling goose got separated out as a distinct species, I’ve been amused by mixed over-wintering flocks consisting of Canada geese and their mini-me’s strolling about.
When I was a kid in Michigan I was also amused watching Canada geese resting on a thinly frozen-over pond. They’d lay down, their body heat would melt a little hole in the ice after several minutes and they would stand-up, move a few feet away, sit down again, melt a new hole and so on. It resulted in a constantly shifting checkerboard pattern on the pond of melted holes, half-melted holes freezing over again and resting geese. It was hilarious :D.
The goslings( here with some mallard duckling ) are pretty cute.
No Canada goose, no nene. Everybody loves nenes.
Canada, I’m guessing.
mmm
As far as geese go, in 1991 the Federal government banned the use of lead shot for waterfowl hunting across the U.S.
And repeat as needed.
you don’t have to put up with them year-round. they overrun any open area, crap everywhere, close beaches due to the bacteria from their crap, attack people, and are just a general pain in the ass.
Oh, I do. We have year-round populations here as well.
Yeah. But I still vaguely like them. I like pigeons and house sparrows as well :). I find most animals interesting, even the destructive ones *. Sometimes especially those.
Mind you I have no problems with having them culled when it is called for. Because they can be destructive fuckers and I’m not really a bunny-hugger - I have no problem with range management. But I still like them.
I don’t like them. They are overly aggressive, feathered turd machine-guns that seem to have twice as many rights as I do. I applaud communities who cull them and find creative ways to process them for a useful purpose.
That said, let just one of them get run over by a car and the whole community is in an up-roar/rage ( up-rage?) with hundreds of blog posts calling for the film from all the Ring cameras w/i two miles and the building of gallows.
Bolding mine
May I please, please use this phrase elsewhere? I remember when, about twenty five years ago, four Canada geese showed up at a local cemetery pond and it made the papers! Now they have multiplie fifty fold, and never go home. Walking to a grave, one needs to be careful where you put your feet. And they have colonized other ponds in town, like near a park where I walk my dog. He tries to eat the poop and I have to drag him away.:mad:
