My daughter, Anna, attended the Carolinas GCSA trade show with me this afternoon. There was a vendor at the show that is in the business of selling boarder collies to golf courses that are primarily used to chase geese away. While we don’t have a need for this at Highlands CC, I spoke with these guys for a little while to learn more out of curiosity. Boarder Collies make excellent bird dogs because of the way they hunt. They hunt in similar fashion to coyotes and the geese are scared by this. It has to do with how low they get their bodies when they approach their prey- again, exactly mimicking a coyote. Labrador Retrievers and other dogs are not effective geese dogs because they tend to get too excited and bounce. The interesting thing is that these dogs often complete their work in 6 months or less and need to be stimulated in other ways once their job is complete. As far as the cost- $4,500 will get you a dog that will sit, come, ride in a golf cart and understand geese. However, it is possible to exceed $10,000 in cost depending on what the goals are. Final thought- you might be wondering why this dog is wearing goggles! This company not only raises dogs for use on golf courses, but smaller airports also use dogs to keep birds away from airplanes. Those dogs wear goggles because debris from being around the runway is common. If one buys a dog, the owner then spends a day with the trainer and dog and is then ready to bring the dog home. This is probably more than you ever wanted to know about golf course dogs!