Canada Geese congregating .(Photo 51883118 © Framed1 - Dreamstime.com)

By Kevin Rothwell

Stop the goose cull petition takes flight

Feb 1, 2021 | 12:32 PM

A Vernon woman has launched an online petition to try change a council decision to spend $41,000 to cull up to 150 resident Canada Geese this spring.

The idea of a cull was brought forward multiple times, and at the Jan. 25, 2021 council meeting, it was approved.

“Today we need to make a change. The city council has decided to spend $41,000 to cull the geese in Vernon to help our beaches. This does not save our beaches. This is wrong! We need to take care of our beaches which means maintenance. There is a machine that cleans up after the geese that we can buy. Stop the cull and buy maintenance machines,” Amanda Peterson said on change.org.

There are turf sweeper machines that some municipalities use in parks to clean up goose droppings and debris, but they only work on grass, which doesn’t solve the issue of droppings on sand and in the water. An average adult goose produces three pounds of waster per day.

The city spent $50,000 last spring to fund a long running egg addling program, and 70 nests were found in 2020.

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The majority of city council and wildlife biologists agree the addling program isn’t keeping the goose population in check, and it’s starting to impact water quality at area beaches.

The birds were intentionally introduced to the Okanagan in the 1970s and with few predators in urban settings, a plentiful food supply and a higher birth rate than migratory geese, the population has exploded.

“Our city needs to have higher standards for our wildlife and be involved in these decisions. Please help me save our wildlife and use our money more wisely,” Peterson said.

Over 90 people had signed the petition as of Feb 1, 2021.

Another petition by Peyton Romeril also on change.org has over 420 signatures.

The city still requires provincial and federal permits to proceed with the cull.

“The reason we have to deal with it is not just icky beaches and unusable playing fields, it’s all sorts of other, more serious things as well,” Coun. Scott Anderson said in a Facebook post. “E-coli in our water, destruction of Indigenous habitat, destruction of indigenous species, aviation risk, loss of tourist dollars (our main economic sector) when our beaches close, or it gets out beyond our city that our beaches are slimy with feces are all reasons this has to go ahead.”