Campus birds go after those who mess with them

The UW campus is filled with wildlife: geese, crows, ducks, squirrels, raccoons and opossums. You might even spot a couple of coyotes here and there.

The geese that students often come across on campus are Canada geese, a non-native species in Washington. Due to messy situations their fecal matter causes, there have been attempts to control large populations. New methods have been developed, including a “very nifty repellent,” said Charles Easterberg, the University’s integrated pest management coordinator.

“It’s a repellent spray for grass,” Easterberg said. “A goose’s vision sees deeper in the blue end of the spectrum. So they see a dye marker in the grass and it gives them indigestion. They learn that grass that looks like that is not good to eat. We don’t use this method at this point, but we might use it next year.”

Goose-repellent flags are also being placed on the soccer fields next to the IMA, where athletes slip and fall due to goose droppings.

“The purpose is to tell geese, ‘Don’t land here. There’s nothing to eat,’” Easterberg said. “So they don’t land there. They just don’t like the flags. … The motion of flags might upset them.”

John Marzluff, a professor at the College of Forest Resouces, is performing research on crows, specifically on how they are able to recognize individual students. For all of you who feed the crows, or any of the other wildlife found on campus, be careful — these birds are smarter than you think.

“The colored bands we put on their legs are a way of identification,” Marzluff said. “And we always saw that after we catch them or band them, they would hold a grudge against us. We put on different masks to see how they respond, and they respond pretty strongly. They have long-term memory for both people who aren’t nice to them and people who are nice to them.”

In addition, just like humans, these crows gossip.

“Once this recognition is developed, we also think they pass that information to other crows,” Marzluff said. “We see a lot of the animals respond negatively to us, and they are ones that we hadn’t caught before. Cultural tradition may develop in part because they recognize people.”

Marzluff added that people who often feed the crows have flocks following them around.

“I’ve seen them swoop down and knock a candy bar out of a guy’s hands,” Marzluff said. “They can get testy.”

Students feeding crows and other animals are definitely one of the reasons why the creatures stick around on campus and why there are so many of them, Marzluff said.

Yet, whether these animals cause problems, the abundance of wildlife on campus certainly adds to the individuality of the UW.

“It’s a unique setting here, where animals are with a large number of people in a small, safe area,” Marzluff said. “There aren’t cars here that drive fast. They don’t get killed here. Their associations with people are good, and there’s lots of it. Squirrels will jump on you, raccoons will sit and look at you, and crows will steal your sandwich. That’s a pretty unique setting. It’s an interesting interaction between people and wildlife. It’s almost like a zoo situation.”

[Reach reporter Kim Lee at development@thedaily.washington.edu.]