Geese that frequent your property are a nuisance, with their loud honks, messy droppings, and sometimes aggressive behavior. When geese find a spot they like, they’ll often return for years, making it difficult to rid your land of these menacing birds. Here’s how you can tell if geese are nesting on your property, and steps you can take to control the geese population.
Signs That Canada Geese are Nesting on Your Property
Are geese just visiting, or have they built a nest somewhere on the property? The following are signs that Canadian geese – officially called Canada geese – may have built a nest.
Aggression Towards People and Pets
Nesting geese can be aggressive towards people, pets, and vehicles. You may experience geese running up to you and hissing at you or attacking other people and pets on the property. These geese are unlikely to be intimidated by you if you move towards them. Geese may also attack cars or peck at windows and glass doors. This behavior puts the people and animals on your property at risk of being injured and puts you at risk of being held liable for such injuries.
Aggression Towards Each Other
A goose that has built its nest on the property may be aggressive towards other geese, especially if it’s trying to protect the nest and the baby geese. You may see geese in conflicts, squawking at other geese or appearing to be fighting each other.
Spotted In the Same Location
Are you frequently seeing a goose in the same part of the property every day? It may have built a nest nearby. Seeing two or more geese by the pond every day can also be a sign that their nest is on your lawn.
Facts About Geese Nesting Habits
Canada geese typically find a mate and begin nesting around the age of 3. They usually stay with the same mate their entire life. One goose nest contains an average of 5 to 6 eggs but can have anywhere from one to 10. After an incubation period of 25 to 30 days, the geese eggs hatch. Baby geese – also called goslings – can feed, walk, and swim within 24 hours and start to fly around 10 weeks old.
Where Do Geese Typically Nest?
Geese are tundra nesters, meaning geese typically nest in low vegetation areas near a water source, such as a pond or area built for water runoff. Geese also prefer their nests to be in areas close to a food source. Geese eat grass as well as berries, seeds, and aquatic plants.
Residential and commercial properties are popular spots for geese when the people there like to share their food with the wildlife. Geese also don’t consider humans to be predators, so they will set up nests near sidewalks, pathways, doorways, golf courses, parking islands, parks, playgrounds, and other areas where humans like to hang out. Buildings in urban areas are also popular spots for nests because they allow geese to see any predators in the area.
When geese find a spot they like for nests, they will return to that spot year after year, making it difficult to keep geese away from your land without the help of professional goose control services.
When is Nesting Season?
The Canada geese nesting season typically runs from mid-February through May.
Why it’s Important to Keep Geese Away
Geese nesting on your property can cause lots of problems for you and your tenants. Geese are noisy, and a group of them can quickly make the property a loud and irritating environment. Geese can also be aggressive, especially during breeding season. If people get too close to a nest, the geese may harass or attack them. People may also injure themselves by falling while trying to protect themselves from the geese. Not only does goose aggression put people at risk, but it also puts you at risk of being held liable for injuries the geese cause.
Geese also pose a health risk to nearby people. Goose droppings can contain parasites and spread E. coli. Geese can also spread listeria, salmonella, chlamydiosis, and pasteurella multocida through feces, biting, and nasal discharge.
Keeping your yard looking nice can also be a struggle with geese present, as geese eat and damage the grass. Additionally, a goose can leave up to two pounds of poop each day, turning your grass and walkways into a disgusting mess.
Preventing geese from calling your land home is important but isn’t always easy. The best way to keep geese away is to hire professionals in Canada geese management and geese control.
Goose Control Options
The best way to prevent geese from residing on your land is to make your land seem like a dangerous place for geese to live. There are many ways to do this, from do-it-yourself methods to professional goose control.
What to Do If You Find a Nest
If you find a goose nest, it may be tempting to remove it or try to chase away the geese. However, there are rules you must follow when it comes to handling wildlife nests. While geese may be a nuisance, it’s still important to keep them safe. Do not remove or destroy a nest. Canada geese are protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918, which makes it illegal to disturb the nest when geese eggs are present without a permit from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Do-It-Yourself Options
If you want to keep geese away so they don’t build nests on your residential or commercial property, there are a variety of Canada geese control methods you can try. Decoys that look like predators hunting local wildlife can be placed in the grass to make the geese think it’s not a safe place for them to be. Goose repellent is a liquid made with a grape extract that can be sprayed onto the grass. When the geese eat the grass, the spray irritates their stomach, and they learn not to eat the grass. You can also use sounds to scare geese away, such as recorded sounds of predators, an air horn, or yelling. However, neighbors may not appreciate this method.
Unfortunately, DIY methods for goose control are often ineffective. The best goose control method is a humane method that uses border collies to herd the geese. This is the service we offer at Goose Masters.
Contact Goose Masters
At Goose Masters, our professional dog handlers work with highly trained border collies to herd geese off the property. The geese are never hurt, but they believe that the property is home to predators and eventually learn to stay away. Our goose control services work on a variety of property types, including golf courses, parks, assisted living communities, private estates, schools, corporate properties, airports, cemeteries, farm properties, and more. Contact us at 336-653-4100 to learn more about humane goose control in the state of North Carolina, South Carolina, or Florida.
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