EGG-STRA EFFORT

PROJECT FOCUSES ON RESIDENT GEESE

Goose droppings can be seen on this dock at Lake Windsor in Bella Vista on Saturday, along with a pair of Canada geese.
Goose droppings can be seen on this dock at Lake Windsor in Bella Vista on Saturday, along with a pair of Canada geese.

BELLA VISTA - Volunteers armed with cooking oil, not shotguns, hope to reduce the number of resident Canada geese here closer to zero, one goose egg at a time.

April is open season on the eggs of Canada geese in nests at Bella Vista’s lakes, golf courses and along Little Sugar Creek which flows through the heart of the city. The geese foul docks, fairways and yards with goose poop, prompting some colorful language from residents.

The goal isn’t to get rid of all Canada geese, but to reduce the number of resident geese that hang around Bella Vista year-round and don’t migrate. Migratory geese, which show up in Bella Vista during winter, are welcome.

These migrant geese are up north in April, nesting and raising young, as is natural for Canada geese.

Unnatural resident geese don’t have the instinct to migrate. They’re here when they shouldn’t be, damaging property and making nests to hatch even more resident geese.

Some 80 volunteers are doing something about the problem. They work with Darrell Bowman, lakes ecologist and fisheries manager with the Bella Vista Property Owners Association, in the Goose Reproduction Intervention Program.

From late March through April, volunteers look for nesting Canada geese around the city. When they find a nest, any eggs are coated with cooking oil to prevent oxygen from getting inside. The female continues to sit on the oiled eggs, but they don’t hatch. Eventually, the female abandons the nest and no young are born.

Egg oiling isn’t designed to eliminate the resident goose population “and that could probably never be achieved through just egg oiling,” Bowman said. “What it does is keep the resident goose population from increasing over time.”

Why not destroy the nest and take the eggs? In most cases the male and female would build another nest.

The female goose could lay more eggs in a matter of days or weeks,Bowman said. Oiling the eggs is the best solution.

It’s working. Volunteers had trouble finding nests this spring. “That indicates we’re reducing the population,” Bowman confirmed.

NEST EGG

Volunteer Bob McGrath on Saturday fired up his fishing boat for a cruise on Lake Windsor to have a look-see at two nests. One was in a lake resident’s back yard, about 20 yards from the water. When McGrath examined it, the nest looked abandoned with no eggs or shells.

Another nest, built of branches and goose down on a small island, contained one egg that had already been oiled. Predators evidently ate the other oiled goose eggs, McGrath said. Animals would prey on the eggs if they were oiled or not.

“We’ve found 85 percent fewer nests this year than last. At Lake Ann there were 11 nests last year. This year, so far, there’s only one,” he said.

Volunteers work in teams to increase the odds of seeing nests, McGrath explained. Nests along the lakes are most always on a resident’s private property. When one of these is found, the property owner is contacted and volunteers ask permission to come on their dock or land to oil any eggs.

No one has said no, McGrath said.

These resident Canada geese (they’re not called “Canadian” geese) lay eggs in some odd places. One goose laid eggs smack in the middle of a pontoon boat cover. McGrath has the picture in a notebook of data he keeps. Another nest was in a flower pot on a dock.

Most nests are along the city’s seven lakes and Bella Vista Lake, which is in Bentonville. There were 39 nests found along the lakes in 2012 and six nests on the golf courses.

At Lake Windsor, McGrath pointed out a pair of geese walking on a small dock. Goose poop was scattered all over the dock. It goes into the water when the waste is swept or washed off .

Resident geese hardly lay golden eggs, but they can cost people a pretty penny. Bowman said the Bella Vista Property Owners Association spent $50,000 in 2008 cleaning up and repairing damage cause by geese around the lakes and golf courses. They defecate and their chewing does damage, Bowman said.

Geese have few predators. There’s no goose hunting in Bella Vista to reduce the number of resident Canada geese, Bowman added.

Bella Vista is a big place, about 25 square miles, according to Bowman. Some nests go undetected and a few goslings are born each spring. A target number is to find at least 80 percent of the nests.

“The goal is to fi nd every goose nest in Bella Vista, coat every egg in cooking oil to prevent any new geese from being born,” Bowman said.

Other steps include harassing geese to keep them away from certain areas. Residents are asked not to feed geese.

“It’s key to understand this is a national problem, the overpopulation of resident Canada geese. And it’s important to understand that we aren’t trying to prevent migrating Canada geese from wintering here. That’s natural and it doesn’t bother anything,” Bowman said.

Bella Vista is the winter home to many migrants. “You see the population really increase during wintertime,” when migratory geese arrive, Bowman said.

TAKE A GANDER

How did these resident geese become a problem in the fi rst place?

Canada geese weren’t common in Arkansas a few decades ago. There was a big re-introduction effort during the 1980s to restore Canada geese populations, Bowman said.

Canada geese in Minnesota were trapped and relocated to Arkansas and other states along the Mississippi flyway waterfowl migration corridor. The number of relocated geese grew, but geese born in Arkansas became residents and do not migrate.

The Canada geese re-introduction was a success, as is the effort in Bella Vista to reduce the number of resident geese that don’t migrate.

Resident goose numbers are going down, but Bowman plans to continue the program.

“The only thing that’ll stop it is if our volunteers quit or we absolutely have no more geese to work with,” Bowman said.

Outdoor, Pages 6 on 04/25/2013

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