DNR will kill geese on Duluth river to help wild rice restoration

DULUTH - Gaggles of geese have foiled plans to restore wild rice on the St. Louis River, leaving those leading the work to a last resort: As many as 300 of the birds will be euthanized next summer to give the native rice a chance to thrive.

Several agencies, including the Wisconsin and Minnesota departments of Natural Resources, have been battling the Canada geese as they work to restore 275 acres of wild rice to the river, part of a plan to remove it from a national list of polluted Great Lakes waterways. Other means of deterring geese from ravaging rice beds have been employed, including decoys, disturbances from kayakers, egg addling (hatching prevention) and fencing.

The estuary was once home to vast beds of wild rice, or manoomin in Ojibwe, which is not only a crucial source of nutrition for the Anishinaabe but part of their origin story. It was the sacred food that brought them to the Great Lakes. Decades of pollution and habitat change "decimated" the St. Louis River's population of rice, and recent efforts to restore it haven't been successful, said Jeramy Pinkerton of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources.

https://www.startribune.com/dnr-will-kill-geese-on-duluth-river-to-help-wild-rice-restoration/600210750/