Canada Geese are a familiar sight across the Midwest. Every fall the massive birds wind their way across the area as they migrate from Canada. But now, the region is also playing home to growing populations of resident geese. Instead of migrating, they stay near shopping centers and residential areas, where there’s a ready supply of food. For several years, one such population kept the residents of a Rochester, New York suburb feeling like they were in a state of siege. The geese chased pedestrians, caused traffic accidents, and left unpleasant signs of their presence almost everywhere. So town officials have hired an unusual business to encourage the geese to live somewhere else. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Bud Lowell has more:
Transcript
Canada Geese are a familiar sight across the Midwest. Every fall the massive birds wind their way across the area as they migrate from Canada. But now, the region is also playing home to growing populations of resident geese. Instead of migrating, they stay near shopping centers and residential areas, where there’s a ready supply of food. For several years, one such population kept the residents of a Rochester, New York suburb feeling like they were in a state of siege. The geese chased pedestrians, caused traffic accidents, and left unpleasant signs of their presence almost everywhere. So town officials have hired an unusual business to encourage the geese to live somewhere else. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Bud Lowell has more.
“There’s hundreds of geese here. They come in the springtime, and after me being here about three or four times, I ended up right down to about 30 or 40 of them.”
Gordon Kornbau is at Westfall Town Park in Brighton, New York with his border collie, Arrow.
“You have to hit ‘em very hard in the beginning, just aggravate the heck out of them twice a day…. different times of the day. They get used to the fact that you’re not going away and they decide to nest somewhere else.”
Kornbau and Arrow are at this park to herd geese. There’s a 10-acre, roughly Y-shaped pond here…tucked up against an expressway. Neatly manicured lawns slope down to the water – and it turns out, that’s paradise for geese. They don’t like tall brush that conceals predators, so there are a lot of them here in the short grass.
But the geese don’t leave the park looking like paradise to humans.
“Look around here and notice all the…this whole blacktop last year was…from one end to the other, a square foot, you couldn’t walk. Same with the grass and stuff like that…Goose poop? Yeah…now we’ve got it down to a minimum. But we’ve got to keep after them. Now they’re done molting and the goslings are ready to fly so we’ve gotta get on them heavy again…. Arrow! C’mere…Arrow (whistles).”
Kornbau sends his collie to circle the pond. The geese know she’s coming. They splash, honking into the water as the dog runs toward them.
“All the way out – (whistles) – keep going!”
(Sound of geese honking)
“Basically, border collies are trained on sheep for years and years. Just transferring them from sheep over to geese isn’t that big a deal.”
Arrow, the Border collie, is half the geese herding process. Under his arm, Gordon Kornbau has been carrying a radio controlled, gas-powered model boat.
As the dog chases the geese into the water, he drops the boat into the pond
(Sound of model boat engine)
Kornbau steers the boat in circles. The annoyed geese take flight, and make for the far corner of the pond.
The Border collie rounds the pond and chases them back. Kornbau launches his boat again.
Every day he does this, a few more of the birds decide to leave for a quieter home someplace else.
“I send Arrow out and she’s scaring them all up…and people are standing there saying, ‘What are you doing – my kid’s having fun feeding the geese!’ Well –I’m sorry but – I have to be the bringer of bad news.”
This “geese herding” has been checked out by New York’s Department of Environmental Conservation. The DEC worked with Gordon Kornbau and the Town of Brighton, and gave the Town’s geese control program it’s OK.
Once in awhile, though, some people do get upset with Kornbau and Arrow. But he says they calm down once he shows them his business card.
A few passersby today seem intrigued by what he’s doing.
“What kind is it? –Border Collie – oh…so this is what a border collie looks like. Yeah…I’ve read about you guys in the paper. Having fun chasin’ those geese, huh?”
The Border collie, Arrow, knows the job is done. She’s back in the station wagon and ready for the next pond.
(Sound of door slamming)
“Nothing to it…good girl…. she’s the best!”
So how does somebody become a geese herder?
Gordon Kornbau was a mechanic at a golf course. He was looking for a business of his own, and that’s when he ran across a newspaper article about businesses in North Carolina and New Jersey that made money by herding geese.
He decided he could do the same thing. Now, Kornbau says he’s got the “best job he’s ever had.” No comment other than a lot of tail wagging from Arrow.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Bud Lowell.