Hoboken City Council is calling in the dogs to rid the city’s parks of the geese that are leaving behind droppings.
"These are wild creatures, and they leave their packages behind," said Hoboken City Council Vice President Phil Cohen. "They include E. coli, they include Listeria, and these are significant bacterial sources that can cause harm to our community as well as being unsightly."
The council voted unanimously last week to spend nearly $19,000 on an emergency contract with Geese Chasers of North Jersey.
The agency will bring in trained border collies to chase the geese away. They don’t attack the birds. The crews will come by daily, and also on-call.
"Unfortunately, when you lay out your lawn blanket and you have your kids crawling around, goose poop is a real issue. There’s also another part of the population control, called egg addling. The agents find undeveloped goose eggs and rub them with corn oil, making them unviable.
At last week’s council meeting, Councilwoman Tiffanie Fisher said they will not addle the eggs with active embryos.
