Looking for humane way to make geese go away
BY DANIELLE MEDINA
Correspondent

BRICK TOWNSHIP — Township officials will soon take a gander at bids to help control the Brick’s abundant Canada geese population.

Acting Business Administrator Scott M. Pezarras said at a recent caucus meeting that the township is looking for a firm that will rid the birds from its various recreation fields and parks.

The township paid $412 per week last year to have border collies chase the geese from various township facilities. Eventually, the geese tire of being hassled by the dogs and go elsewhere.

“Nothing works like real dogs,” Pezarras said.

Councilman Stephen C. Acropolis suggested that the township also consider addling the geese eggs as a way of bringing the geese problem under control.

Addling is a means of managing bird populations by arresting the development of their eggs.

An unlikely option would be how township officials in Colts Neck handled their geese population, Pezarras said.

“They led them into trailers and they gassed them,” Pezarras said.

Greenbriar II resident Richard Gross said that the wooden cutouts of dogs used in that development are also effective and offered to make some for the township.

The wooden cutouts, however, have to be moved frequently in order to be effective.

In August, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided to allow state wildlife agencies, airports and property owners more flexibility in handling the resident Canada geese population, including expanding the hunting season and eliminating the need for federal permits to take the birds.

However, Brick has a no-discharge-of-firearms law within the township’s borders, so hunting on township properties is not an option.

The township’s purchasing department will prepare bid specifications and advertising for the bids over the next several weeks.