A honkin' problem for Oregon farmers

Among the troubling factors:

Cackling Canada geese are among the most numerous and ravenous subspecies in Oregon. But native Alaskans depend on them for food and would like to see their numbers much higher.

Dusky Canada geese are most unsteady, in part because the Alaska earthquake of 1964 ruined their nesting grounds. But they are also the least wary and most vulnerable to hunting, so efforts to hunt other subspecies often nail them instead.

Rules meant to keep hunters from accidentally shooting dusky geese -- including a written exam on goose identification -- have become such a hassle some have given up goose hunting. That leaves fewer hunters to control other, more numerous geese.

Aleutian Canada geese frequent the coast and have multiplied so rapidly in number they were dropped from the federal endangered list. But they remain on the state endangered list, which prohibits hunting them in Oregon.

A goose control plan called for hazing geese away from farms and planting feed crops to keep them satiated, at an estimated cost of about $2 million a year. But federal money peaked at about $800,000 and has since dropped to zero.

"Everyone likes the birds," said Tim Bernasek of the Oregon Farm Bureau. "It's just that there's so many of them, they're kind of out of their natural balance, and we need to do something about it."

The graceful fliers have been known in some places to hiss and charge to protect their territory.

Most of the geese nest each summer in Alaska. They head south each fall, and historically only some 25,000 dusky Canada geese stopped in the Willamette Valley for the winter. Most of the rest flew by, staging in the vast wetlands of the Klamath Basin on the California-Oregon line, and gliding on to California's Central Valley.

But in the 1970s, the picture began changing.

Two subspecies of Canada geese -- lesser and Taverner's -- began halting their migration in the Willamette Valley, Trost said. That boosted winter geese numbers by some 50,000 or more.

By the 1990s, more than 100,000 cackling Canada geese also gave up the long flight through the Klamath Basin to California and began wintering in the Willamette Valley. And western Canada geese, the only subspecies that nests in the Northwest, also multiplied. A seventh subspecies is the Vancouver Canada goose.

Over the same decades, the dusky Canada goose that was the original winter goose in Oregon declined. Winter hunting in Oregon may have been one cause, but the 1964 Alaska earthquake also raised the bird's nesting grounds on Alaska's Copper River Delta about six feet.

That dried out the once-marshy expanse, and predators such as brown bears and eagles moved in to hunt geese and their young.

So while the dusky goose's condition turned shaky, it was soon far outnumbered in Oregon by other geese. It created a sticky situation where managers believe there are too many of certain kinds of geese and altogether too many geese concentrated in Oregon, but too few of some subspecies.

It's tough to promote hunting of some, however, while protecting others.

Nobody knows exactly why so many geese began wintering in the Willamette Valley instead of California. Biologists say it may be some combination of factors, including:

Greater refuge from hunting in Oregon, in part because of protections for dusky geese.

Loss of California habitat to urban sprawl and development.

A decline of Klamath Basin wetlands that were an important rest stop.

Global warming that is changing nesting and migration dates.

The rise of Oregon grass farms that offered the birds a kind of handy salad bar.

"There used to be a bigger area for them to winter," said Myron Naneng, president of the Association of Village Council Presidents, a coalition of western Alaska native villagers who rely on cackling geese and their eggs for food. "We know that California has turned most of its land into golf courses."

Cackling geese now number about 150,000, but the Alaska natives would like to boost that upward of 200,000, he said. They have been meeting in recent years with Oregon farmers, who would rather have fewer of the birds.

"They want to keep the population high, but down here they're killing the farmers in the Willamette Valley and Southwest Washington," said George Thoeny, who farms in Clark County, Wash.

Both the farmers and Alaska natives hope to find ways of reducing the conflict between geese and Oregon farms. An Oregon State University study found goose grazing reduces crop production by as much as 24 percent.

Farmers argue the Legislature's resolution will help pry loose more federal money to help chase geese away from farm fields and compensate farmers for growing crops that feed geese.

But other farmers say they have about given up hope of help.

"You can put scarecrows out, you can put (noise) cannons out, and they just get used to it," Donald said. "It doesn't scare them. You can see geese grazing right around them."

Michael Milstein: 503-294-7689; michaelmilstein@news.oregonian.com