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Published April 09. 2022 6:55PM | Updated April 10. 2022 8:22PM

Norwich — At the command, “Away!” shouted by Emily Tansey, border collie Beau raced down the ramp to the concrete fishing dock at the Howard T. Brown Memorial Park at Norwich Harbor on Friday morning.

The 2-year-old dog looped up a different ramp to the park lawn, darted about, sniffing the grass and bushes, then on command lay down in front of Tansey. Up again, they headed to the boat launch. A few mallard ducks had hopped onto a concrete dock. Beau raced down the ramp, and the ducks retreated to the center of the harbor. The park is situated where the Shetucket and Yantic rivers converge into the Thames River.

There were no Canada geese at the park during a light drizzle Friday morning, but goose feces dotted the park lawn in spots. That's the main reason the Norwich Public Works Department hired Tansey and Beau to work the park — where dogs are not allowed, let alone off leash — at random times each day.

Later Friday, under bright blue skies and sunshine and with several park visitors enjoying the warm weather, more than a dozen Canada geese and ducks swam up the boat launch for a look. They quickly retreated, geese honking in alarm as Beau jumped into the water and gave chase.

The city is paying Tansey, a former Groton Town police officer and now owner of Wingman Goose Control, $500 per week for four months to try to make Brown Park unwelcome to geese and ducks.

“He’s earning his keep,” Norwich Public Works Director Patrick McLaughlin said. “Boy, he’s a worker. She gave me a demonstration before we committed to it.”

Dozens of Canada geese and mallard ducks have made the park their home in recent years, increasingly attracted to the boat launch area by well-meaning human visitors throwing them bread, bird seed or corn. Large colorful signs have not dissuaded some park patrons.

“Feeding ducks and geese pollutes the water,” one sign states. “DO NOT FEED THEM.” The sign lists hazards of feeding bread, sweets and biscuits to the birds, including poor nutrition, overcrowding, unnatural behavior, pollution and delayed migration. The sign lists the fowl’s natural foods, including water plants, grass, insects, shellfish, berries and seeds.

Tansey said she gets mixed reactions from park patrons, some of whom object to Beau scaring the geese or being off leash. As a working dog with a licensed handler, Beau is allowed to be off leash.

A bird lover herself, Tansey said she tries to explain the goal of keeping the wild fowl wild. In three weeks of visiting Brown Park with Beau, Tansey said she has seen one Canada goose with a deformed foot and one mallard with a deformed bill. Poor nutrition could be the cause, she speculated.

“It’s really not good for the birds that people are feeding them bread, sugar cereal, even commercial bird pellets,” she said. “Even feeding them commercial duck food is not good, because of the bacteria they’re picking up.”

Sitting in her car talking to other park visitors out the window late Friday afternoon, Jennifer Rodriguez of Norwich readily admitted she has been feeding the ducks and geese regularly since 2018, mostly corn. She said she has not fed them since she spoke with Tansey a week ago.

“You know, they’re born here, and they’re raised here,” Rodriguez said of the fowl. She said the birds will just retreat and return to the park.

“I don’t think it’s going to work,” she said.

Tansey said geese and ducks often swarm at the boat launch when park visitors park near there or walk past, expecting people to bring food. But already, the Canada geese have come to know Tansey’s car and Beau. Even before she lets Beau out of the car, the geese walk away from her car.

Beau, trained as a herding dog, is attempting to herd the geese and ducks rather than catch them, Tansey said, but they take flight instead. The effort is to teach the birds that Brown Park is “not a reliable, safe place” to congregate.

Tansey, 38, of Lisbon, who worked as a Groton Town police officer from 2008 to 2014, said she started the goose control business last year, as she wanted to find a job working with dogs outdoors. Beau was born in Montana and trained in Virginia. Tansey worked with Beau’s trainer in Virginia. She then obtained a Connecticut license as a wildlife control operator.

When she brought Beau home to Lisbon, she launched Wingman Goose Control full time in the summer of 2021. The Norwich park is her only municipal or commercial assignment thus far, but she also works on private properties in the region.

While Beau does most of the work, sometimes, Tansey resorts to a little technology in the form of a 20-inch-long, battery-powered, remote-controlled speedboat with a loud humming motor. Geese honked and swam from the machine Friday, while ducks took flight and resettled farther from shore.

Alondra Almanzar of Norwich stood on a dock with her 13-month-old daughter and cousin Denisse Delacruz visiting from New York. Tansey alerted them that Beau would be running on the dock. The two women and child did not shy away but stood and watched.

“It was cool to watch,” Almanzar said of both Beau and the mini speedboat. “I didn’t know people had jobs to do that.”

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