City looking into geese control

City looking into ramping up geese control

Mar 27, 2019 | 1:53 PM

Look out geese !

The City of Vernon is looking into adding another person to help combat the geese population.

The city says they currently have one person working in the mornings for geese control but council wants to see if it is possible to add a second person in the afternoons.

The motion was put forward by Councillor Dalvir Nahal.

“Birds are very smart, so they know that in the morning their lives are threatened, and then they come back in the evenings, is there any way we can have someone threatening their lives in the evenings as well?”.

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Look out Geese ! The City of Vernon is looking into adding someone to help out with geese control in the afternoons . pic.twitter.com/phlm3qrFJk

— Vernon Matters (@VernonMattersca) March 27, 2019

Coun. Scott Anderson and Mayor Victor Cumming spoke out at Monday’s city council meeting and said that the issue of geese in city parks and beaches is something that should be addressed.

“Last summer the geese decided to live semi-permanently on the beach at Paddlewheel park so as you are going from the washrooms to the beach, the right hand side became occupied all day and they became quite aggressive,” said Cumming.

Nahal and Cumming agreed that the geese have been preventing people from enjoying city parks and beaches.

“There is no point in having a park, if the geese are going to be… we might as well just build them a house and move the playground out because what is the point , I don’t have children I don’t go there, but it’s disgusting you don’t want children even being in that vicinity,” said Nahal.

“It’s like planet of the apes but planet of the geese in there,” she added.

The city currently controls geese by using scare tactics and they fund a portion of the the Okanagan Valley Goose Management Program which uses egg addling, post-addling gosling surveys, leg-banding, and aerial population surveys as a way to control geese throughout the valley.

City staff will now look into the feasibility of hiring an additional person and they will provide a report back to council.