The Canada goose, according to those in the know, tastes like a dark, tender cut of smoked chicken.
That’s Canada goose from elsewhere in the country, mind you, where birds killed as part of government plans to shrink the goose population are plucked, frozen and distributed to food pantries. Food banks in Pennsylvania, for example, received 900 pounds of goose meat this year. Geese were also donated this summer to food banks in Maryland and Oregon.
But in New York State, geese that were killed this month were double-bagged and thrown in landfills. Among them – the total numbers have not yet been released – were nearly 400 geese from Prospect Park in Brooklyn.
The mass goose kill in Prospect Park — the idea is to keep them from flying into the engines of jet planes — set off outrage on City Room, where many comments railed against the killings, but others wondered: If we must kill them, why don’t we feed them to the homeless?
The official answer to that question came from Farrell Sklerov, a spokesman for the city’s Department of Environmental Protection. He said that the state doesn’t have a protocol for testing the geese for toxins and has not figured out how best to process the meat.
New York, Mr. Sklerov wrote in an e-mail, doesn’t have “sufficient guidelines that pertain to the oversight of the safe preparation or donation of geese to food pantries or soup kitchens.”
A high-level official at the federal Department of Agriculture elaborated, saying that city and state officials have waited six years for the New York State Department of Health to report on the safety of New York bird meat.
“We’re looking for a letter somewhere along the lines that says Canada geese are safe to eat, or that one should consume only a certain amount of Canada goose a month, kind of like the state does with fish,” he said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
In central Oregon, the Bend Park and Recreation District convened public meetings on ridding Canada geese from city parks.
There, officials ultimately decided to kill 109 geese with carbon dioxide, which is how New York geese were killed this month. The gas doesn’t make the meat unsafe, according to a spokesman for the American Veterinary Medical Association, who said it was often used to stun poultry.
Don Horton, the executive director of the Bend park district, said the geese were sent to a slaughterhouse, where they were processed and smoked, at $15 a bird.
“For us, the cost was not exorbitant, but if you’re killing 2,000 birds, the cost gets interesting,” Mr. Horton said.
He said he was confused by New York’s stated concern that the birds might not be safe to eat. “These are the same geese hunted by hunters all the time,” he said.
In Pennsylvania, wildlife killed because it has been deemed a nuisance to crops or parks must be donated to food banks.
“The state permit states that the geese shall be donated to a food bank or a shelter – that is a requirement of the permit itself, so they have to abide by that, or they lose the permit,” said Jason DeCoskey, who oversees special permit enforcement for the Pennsylvania Game Commission.
Mr. DeCoskey said the Department of Agriculture had a contract with a plucking house in southern Pennsylvania.
Deer make up the bulk of wildlife killed, he said, and when they are, “the U.S.D.A. will automatically call to find out if there are any needy families nearby to get them the meat.”
In central Oregon, where the killed geese provided more than 1,000 hot meals, residents lashed out against the food bank director for accepting the meat.
Patrick Kwan, the New York State director for the Humane Society of the United States, also disagreed with the gesture. “What they are trying to do is make an unnecessary act seem charitable,” he said.
“We knew all along that there was a lot of opposition and that taking the meat from the geese and using that meat to feed the hungry by donating it to these two food banks would temper the opposition,” he said.
While nowadays abundant, Canada Geese are wild birds (as distinct from farm poultry) therefore legally governed by the game (hunting) laws. They may be killed and butchered only in a few months of the year, and only in approved locations: and selling the meat commercially is a crime.
While the goose is, for the most part, no longer cooked at Christmas time as a part of either nations tradition, this may seem puzzling to some in the United States. The Canada goose is an abundant and conspicuous bird here. To those in the know (hunters, mostly), they are considered a great meal, referred to by some as the “roast beef of the skies.”
Yet even without the literary influence of our esteemed Mr. Dickens, Americans unique history with the Canada goose, beginning in Colonial times, has played out in such a way as to insure that it would never become our preferred holiday fowl. The reason is related to how and where we have managed this species, once rare, back to abundance.
Like gulls, pigeons, rats and other commensal animals around us, we are not inclined to eat geese, which have achieved quite a different in the public imagination since Dickens, describing the meat of this bird, observed that its “tenderness and flavour, size and cheapness, were the themes of universal admiration.” Our animal “pests,” by contrast, are associated with real and imagined public health concerns.
Steve Zack is Coordinator of Bird Conservation at the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), a conservation organization that also runs the Bronx Zoo, New York Aquarium and other facilities. Zack contributed this article to Live Sciences Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.
Christmas is coming, the geese are getting fat Please to put a penny in the old mans hat. If you havent got a penny, a hapenny will do, If you havent got a hapenny then God bless you! ~Traditional nursery rhyme
“The state permit states that the geese shall be donated to a food bank or a shelter – that is a requirement of the permit itself, so they have to abide by that, or they lose the permit,” said Jason DeCoskey, who oversees special permit enforcement for the Pennsylvania Game Commission.
The mass goose kill in Prospect Park — the idea is to keep them from flying into the engines of jet planes — set off outrage on City Room, where many comments railed against the killings, but others wondered: If we must kill them, why don’t we feed them to the homeless?
Mr. DeCoskey said the Department of Agriculture had a contract with a plucking house in southern Pennsylvania.
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Eating Canada geese: a delicious solution to New Jersey’s goose problem
FAQ
Why don t people eat Canadian geese?
Why is goose no longer eaten?
Why don t people hunt Canadian geese?
Why are Canadian geese protected in the US?
Are Canada goose good to eat?
And not only are the birds good to eat—they are also fun to hunt. Because of their flâneur-like loitering, a Canada Goose might seem an easy snatch, but it takes skill to nab one. To catch a goose, Larsen will set up a flock of decoys designed to attract the attention of his prey in an area near to where the geese congregate.
Do Canada geese taste bad if you roast them?
Canada geese taste awful if you roast them or cook them similarly to how you would handle a domestic goose. However, there are several things that you can do to make them delicious. The reason for this is that Canada goose meat is extremely lean, and the globs of fat that are stored around the breast meat are completely rank.
Why are Canada geese a pest?
Because we have unwittingly provided abundant food, habitat and security from predators, these Canada geese populations have few checks on population growth. As a result, the revived giant Canada goose in the east and south is now a common and resident pest. So, too, the large western Canada goose subspecies.
Are Canada geese tough to cook?
Wild goose meat is definitely distinct, and Canada geese are on the far end of the tough and gamey spectrum. There are a few key things that make Canada geese challenging to cook well. For one, Canada geese can live a pretty long time. They can live from 10 to 25 years in the wild.