Infestation

My family's house back in MN has a large pond it the backyard. This may sound like a good deal and many pretty views but it brought something else with it: geese. Some people think Canadian Geese are beautiful and majestic animals. These people have never had them in their backyard. They poop everywhere and are among the dumbest animals alive. Our pond would be frozen solid in November with the temperatures barely reaching 10 degrees and there will still be two dozen geese on our pond. Migrate south already!

I thought I had been rid of this problem ever since the fence went up in our backyard and I moved away from home. However, I was wrong. There happens to be a large pond across the street from our church and, you guessed it, geese now roam freely on the church property. Of course, they act like they own the place. A line of cars will be coming through our main entrance on a Sunday morning and they will be standing in the middle of traffic. Even though the cars will honk incessantly at them, the geese will continue to stand and stare at the drivers. They turn the sidewalks around church into a minefield and an unsuspecting visitor may accidentally step in a pile of green. Ick!

Today, the battle came to a head. A pair of geese decided it would be a good idea to nest right beside one of our main doorways at church. And then they get mad at us for walking near the nest. Stupid animals. Facing off against an angry goose is quite an experience. They will actually charge at a person, neck parallel to the ground, beak pointed straight at you. And they hiss. It's actually kind of weird. But a poor child who was walking with her parents today was almost bitten. Yeah, not cool and I can understand that a large, fat charging goose can be a scary experience for a child.

The church calls animal control thinking it will do something to help. They were nice enough to drive by and tell us, just let them be for a week or two. Alright, I'm sorry. We run a large preschool that has a main entrance right where these geese have nested and the children are all dropped off there. What's more important, these geese or the humans? Let's be realistic here! There are more than enough geese (this is why there are such high limits on how many geese you can kill while hunting) and these geese are more pests than anything. But unfortunately, the geese saga will continue as we wait for them to hatch. Hopefully I won't get attacked by one in the meantime...