San Jose State putting plastic coyotes on football field to scare off geese
While official practices are still a couple weeks away for San Jose State University football, the team is already facing a formidable opponent: geese taking bathroom breaks on its practice fields.
"It's never been as bad as it's been, really, the last couple of years," said SJSU Athletic Director Jeff Konya. "I'm not sure if it's a new migration pattern or where these geese are coming from, but there's certainly been an uptick in geese and geese offerings."
Flocks of geese have been descending on the football team's practice fields throughout the summer, which means staff members were spending more than two hours picking up geese poop, according to Garrett Wolfe, the university's assistant athletic director for football operations.
"What we didn't want to do is have to come out here before every practice and pick up seven black trash bags full of geese poop by hand," Wolfe recalled. "I walked back into the office after practice and said, 'I am never doing that again.'"
Wolfe searched online for a range of solutions to deter geese from converging onto the practice fields, including motion-activated lasers "which seemed to work the best but came with a high price tag."
Wolfe soon found his solution: plastic coyotes.
The deterrence has mostly worked with some minor exceptions.
"I think it just made it a little bit more manageable to maintain the cleanliness of the field," he said. "The ability to just come out and clean up small spaces vs. two 100-yard football fields obviously takes way less time."
The effects are appreciated by players, including Nick Nash, who led the team in touchdowns, yards, and receptions last season.
"It's nice not to have to worry about landing in geese crap when you're diving for a ball," Nash said. "It's much more than having to worry about having to fall in geese poop. It's a lot, like, mental. It's just nice to have a coach that really cares about keeping our space clean. [It's] clean enough where we don't have to worry about falling in geese crap every time we're playing out here. It's just a big boost of confidence in our program."
Nash also said he is now a fan of coyotes because of the effectiveness the plastic defenders have had.
"Stepping [on geese droppings] is one thing, but football is a very physical game. We're always on the ground. So you've got it on your arms, your legs, all over your jersey. It's no fun. I'm sure it's not fun for our equipment manager, Hank, to clean it up, too," Nash said. "You know, I'm fine with getting grass in my mouth and stuff. But one time, I got geese poop in my mouth and it was no fun. I had to go straight to the trainer, grab some water, wash my mouth out, and had to grab my toothbrush after practice."
SJSU's athletic department originally purchased four coyotes, but "two of them mysteriously went missing," according to Wolfe.
"[The plastic coyotes have] kind of been a bit of a rallying cry, both in the staff room and within the team," Wolfe said. "Something as little as putting a coyote out every night saves you a couple of hours a day. There's unique challenges here, and this was one of them. So we just found a unique solution."
"Innovation's part of what we try to do. [The plastic coyotes are a] super effective, cost-effective measure to try and help protect our fields," Konya said. "We want to have the best facilities for our student athletes to train. And certainly don't want it tarnished by what geese can do."