Dave Swickard begins a new day by awaking at the crack of dawn and leaving his suburban home to get ready for a new, exciting day on the farm. A typical day for Swickard (however according to him, not one day is typical) consists of feeding the animals, cleaning the pens and making sure everything is going smoothly.
However, Swickard is not your ordinary Kansas cattle farmer. He works with a variety of livestock, such as llamas, goats, sheep, horses, ducks, chickens, cows, and alpacas. Swickard not only shows his alpacas, but has another job which consumes the majority of his time.
Grasslands adjacent to water serve as active nesting grounds for the Canadian goose. Places such as golf courses, parks and corporate centers can be a gold mine for these geese to be found nesting. These Canadian geese eat about four to four and a half pounds of grass per day, and typically leave about a pound to a pound and a half of excrements per day. This makes for an unhealthy, and unsightly, environment left behind by these pesky birds. Citizens, especially children, are at risk from these geese because they are very territorial and can be somewhat dangerous when believe to be in threat.
This is where Swickard and his highly trained border collies step in.
Swickard’s border collies have been trained with Scottish commands (to send the dog to the left it’s ‘come by’ and to send it to the right it’s ‘away’) in order to mesmerize and intimidate the geese by giving them a wolf-like glare, called the ‘eye’.
“Each dog has its own personality,” Swickard said. “And has to be trained differently, just as children must be raised differently. No one dog is alike.”
The Geese Police company was founded by a gentleman by the name of Dave Marcks in 1996, who unearthed the use of these border collies to keep geese off of his golf course.
“Sprays, pyrotechnics, flags, decoys. You name it, we tried it,” Marcks said. “It was almost twenty one years ago when I got my first border collie. Six weeks later I had no geese on my golf course.”
Ever since Swickard heard of the company, he took his love of the outdoors and animals to another level by adopting the franchise and bringing the Geese Police to the greater Kansas City area.
It took about two years overall for him to get the business booming and known throughout the surrounding counties. It was an easy thing for him to spread the word.
“Dave has always been charismatic and personable,” older brother, Mark Swickard said. “With those personality traits and his love of the outdoors, I know he loves what he does. He was never one of those people that enjoyed being cooped up in an office all day.”
Dave Swickard enjoys what he does but admits to not taking his job so seriously. He has several other men who give him daily help and go out on runs with some of the other border collies when he is on another call, or even sick. When business is at a peak from all the complaints during the geese’ mid-spring to late summer nesting season, Swickard receives help from his nephew, Devin Tate.
“I enjoy working with my uncle in a relaxed environment,” Tate said. “It’s something I enjoy doing because it’s not monotonous like some jobs can be, plus I can look forward to something interesting happening each day.”
Swickard is constantly looking to better his community and work for the benefit of others. With this job come many responsibilities and bumps in the road, but spending each day doing the thing he loves to do, and where he loves to do it is more than he could ask for.