Lake Tabor geese escape 2012 hunt

By DEUCE NIVEN

    Geese who frequent Lake Tabor won a reprieve from area hunters aiming to kill them this year.
    That, lake resident and local attorney Bill Phipps said, is because the feathery pests seem to be fewer in number in 2012. Its’ not clear why.
    “They killed a good number last year,” Phipps said of the second annual hunt sanctioned by the Tabor City Council.
    Council approved requests voiced by Phipps in 2010 and 2011 to grant an exception to local law banning the discharge of weapons within the town limits only for the purpose of taking geese at the lake.
    Council never tackled the topic this year, Town Manager Al Leonard said, because no one ever asked.
    “Council responded to a request from citizens,” Leonard said. “There was no request this year.”
    With just a few days before the early hunting season for Canadian Green ends – it was open during the month of September – there will be no time for a lake specific request this year.
    “It really hasn’t been much of an issue,” Phipps said. “I haven’t seen the goose feathers at my house, or the goose poop.”
    Should the birds return in enough numbers to be a nuisance in 2013, Phipps said he or other lake residents might be back before council.
    But not this year.
    “They don’t bother us, and we don’t kill them,” Phipps said. “It only seems fair.”