Change the Habitat

The best way to avoid Canada geese problems (and often the most cost-effective in the long run) is to change the habitat so it doesn't appeal to them. You can do this by taking away their preferred foods and creating a landscape where the birds don't feel safe.

Habitat changes will work better if geese can go to a "tolerance zone" that meets their needs. Leave geese tolerance zones and the geese in them alone. Then geese will vacate zero-tolerance zones more readily.

Reduce Food Sources

Like most of us, if Canada geese find their favorite food spread out in easy reach, they will eat it. But you can close the free buffet!

• Reduce the total amount of lawn.
• Where you keep lawn, reduce the young grass shoots geese like the most. Let grass grow taller—at least six inches and leave taller grass over winter. Stop or limit watering and fertilizing in the spring.
• Replace Kentucky bluegrass (a.k.a. "goose candy") with other grasses such as tall fescue. This works where geese can eat somewhere else. They will eat fescue and almost any short grass or legume if that's all there is.
• Do not feed geese. Human food is not healthy for them and geese will gather where they are fed.

Visual Scare Devices

You may get some short-term relief using scare devices like those listed below, though geese lose their fear of these devices rather quickly.

• Flags, eyespot balloons and Mylar tape.
• Floating alligator heads and dead goose decoys.
• Fake owls and snakes, scarecrows or other effigies, especially ones that don't move.
• Coyote and other canine effigies or cutouts, with one possible exception. Where geese have learned to fear real coyotes or where trained goose-herding dogs are regularly working, fake canines may keep geese on their toes a little longer. These work best when they are moved frequently and are on swivels so that they appear more real when moved by the wind.

Audible Scare Devices

Frightening noises like those made by devices listed below can work a little better. But geese get used to noises quickly, especially in noisy neighborhoods and if the geese see no other reason to be scared. Frightening noises work much better if the geese see a mobile threat such as:

• Pyrotechnics and propane cannons
• Recordings of goose distress calls

Chemical Repellants

Another option for discouraging geese from areas is to use chemical repellents. These chemicals can be either be dispersed as a fog or sprayed on grass to keep geese away from high priority areas.

• Anthraquinone triggers a strong, harmless digestive irritation and teaches geese to avoid treated areas.
• Methyl anthranilate is a grape flavoring in our food. To geese, it just tastes really bad.

Repellents must be reapplied after heavy rains or when growing grass is mowed, so plan their use when it can be most effective.