Remember when the site of a vee in the sky and the melodious honking of geese was a special treat and signaled the onset of fall? Well that, like the smell of burning leaves is a thing of the past. The sight of geese nowadays is a sight few like to see. Overpopulation, sanitation, and site fouling are just a few of the problems associated with the big Canada. Retention ponds around schools, hospitals, Big box stores and office parks play host to hundreds of thousands of these 20lb. pests. Hardly any urban areas are immune.
A goose on a good day eats four pounds of feed expelling two. A flock of twenty five at the local high school biology pond drops 50 lbs. A day. The rest is just a math problem that you can figure. There are some solutions to the problem many costly, many ineffective. Geese typically mate for life and have four to eight nestlings. If the population in your area seems to be getting bigger every year, it is, not only are the adults returning but many of the first year birds are returning also. Geese will continue to return to he same site annually because the site affords them safety, food sources, and nesting sites. Add to that the fact that geese can live twenty plus years and you have a major problem. When will it end. Anti hunters be damned.
There are numerous methods to deter geese from calling your property home. These include hazing (Border Collies), addling (Shaking the eggs), chemical treatments, audio/visual (explosions, predator decoys) , roundups (during molt they’re captured and shipped off) and property modification (reshaping terrain)
Golf course maintenance is hampered not only by the cost of control of the geese, but also the excess wear on golf course maintenance equipment. Greens are especially susceptible, the nitrogen in the droppings causes the shorter grass to burn out and makes it difficult to maintain the pristine condition of the green. Ponds on the course are also being fouled, making fishing golf courses (if your lucky enough to have permission) less attractive than in the pre-goose era.
Then there was the one about the golfer eyeing up a 15 foot put for Eagle on the goose infested course. After getting the proper read on the putt he laid his cigar on the fringe and proceeded to can the putt. While still on an emotional high from the putt, he reached down and picked up what he thought was his cigar and inhaled heartily. You can imagine the rest.
