Denver Officials Killing Thousands of Canada Geese
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“We’ve created the perfect environment for geese,” laments Scott Gilmore, deputy parks director in Denver, where the population of Canada geese has soared in recent decades and a controversial cull is underway.
An estimated 5,000 geese live in the city and thousands more visit during their annual migration. “We get so many complaints about people coming out here with a blanket to sit on the grass, and they cannot sit on the grass because there’s so much goose poop in the parks,” Gilmore tells KDVR.
To deal with the nuisance, authorities have started capturing the birds, killing them, and giving them to an organization that donates meat to families in need. “They are getting processed, and they’re getting donated to needy families,” says Gilmore.
City authorities say they have tried other methods to deal with the birds, including oiling the eggs so they can’t hatch, deporting them to other states, and scaring them away with a machine called the Goosinator.
With the assistance of the USDA, Denver plans to cull around 2,200 geese, which can’t fly at this time of year because they are molting. Residents, some of whom call the cull cruel and unnecessary, say they have seen workers rounding up many families of geese in local parks, the Denver Post reports.
Gilmore says a few dozen birds are being spared at each location. “We’re not trying to get rid of all the geese in the city,” he says. “We’re just trying to manage to a more healthy population in the parks system.”
Edited via Newser.
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My brother has a business that builds sets and scenery and props for Broadway shows. He provided materials for “Peter Pan”, including a Styrofoam alligator with large red “jewels” for eyes. When the ‘gator’s head got broken off, Bro delivered another ‘gator, and they gave him the remains of the old one to take back.
It was late on a Friday, he just took the truck home. He was having a pond party so he thought the gator would make a fun prop at his beach. Of course the kids got playing with it and the head ended up in the water.
He saw it floating out in the pond the next day and thought he’d collect it when it blew into the shore somewhere. And promptly forgot about it.
A couple days later on a walk around the pond he noticed there had not been any ducks or geese around the pond. He thought it strange. He saw the gator head in the weeds, fished it out and put it in the chest with the rest of the kids’ beach toys.
The next day he noticed the geese and ducks were back. That evening the kids were playing on the beach again and the gator got out in the pond again.
Next day, no ducks or geese.
To make a long story short, he developed a business selling “‘Gator Guard”s. Throw one in your fountain, pond, lake, and the migratory birds leave because they know what an alligator is.
He made them himself for a few years, then sold the product to the bird repeller company Birdex. They are making them cheaply in China (about $3 each in container loads FOB NY NY) and they look cheap compared to the ones he made. But they still seem to work.
https://www.thepondguy.com/product/bird-x-gator-guard-decoy?p=CSE&CAWELAID=730009880000007402&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIzrWCydme4wIVmZOzCh00egedEAQYAiABEgKarfD_BwE