Owen Sound is for Bird Lovers

One of the reasons I chose to move back to small town living after spending my adult life in cities is my desire to reconnect with nature.

When people check Google to see if Owen Sound is a nice place to live, you often get answers pertaining to the many parks and wildlife.

In this video, I’m visiting one of my daily haunts, Harrison Park, to feed the geese.

Things have been very different as far as bird life goes for Harrison Park.

This winter, city officials were forced to euthanize dozens of birds that had been infected with an avian flu.

Since that time, the bird population has been slow to recapture its former glory.

As you’ll see in the video, the goose population is exactly where it needs to be and they’re more than happy to accept your food offerings.

Couple of (very) important notes about feeding birds in the area.

1) Please do not feed bread to birds.

A bird’s stomach is simply not designed to process bread and therefore causes them far more harm than good. For more information about that, check out this resource.

2) Keep your dogs on a leash.

In being a domesticated pet, your dog has no need to partake in any aspect of wildlife. What this means is any interaction your canine has with local wildlife (not just the birds) is a needless cause of stress.

I’ve watched dog owners allow their dogs to chase after goslings and baby swans, which is completely unacceptable behavior. This could lead to young birds dying from the stress of such a situation.

One local dog owner was caught allowing his dog to kill a helpless gosling and let’s just say that really didn’t end well for him.

You might also want to take note that some swans could very well face your dog head on in such a situation and brutally attack it, or even outright kill it.

If you enjoy feeding birds as much as I do, you can always find more of them milling about at Kelso Beach, the Boat Launch and down by the Harry Lumley Bayshore Community Centre.