Dartmouth Police Become ‘Guardians of the Geese’ in Adorable Video

The members of the Dartmouth Police Department are always ready to answer the call, whether it’s something as simple as directing traffic or as serious as solving a crime.

Recently, though, the officers in one Dartmouth cruiser took on a different role: guardians of the geese.

“We wear many hats,” Dartmouth Police wrote in a Facebook post. “Protectors of wildlife being one of them.”

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Saturday night at about 8:56 p.m., Dartmouth resident Nicole Wilkinson was at the Shaw’s Supermarket on Route 6, right around the Dartmouth-New Bedford line. There, she just happened to capture on video the moment when a gaggle of Canada geese was being escorted down Route 6 by the Dartmouth Police.

“I think they were marching back to Buttonwood,” Wilkinson told WBSM. “I thought it was adorable and I’m thankful that they had an escort. That can be a dangerous road!”

You might think that it since it was close to 9 p.m., the geese were up past their bedtime; in actuality, though, Canada geese like to travel at night – especially when it comes to flying.

According to a Forbes article, large birds like geese prefer flying at night because because there’s less air turbulence, it’s cooler (they have to pump their wings constantly to fly, unlike other birds that soar), and because there are less predators in the skies at night.

As for why they were walking down Route 6 at 9 p.m.? Well, perhaps they all just came back from a late dinner at Joe’s Original a little up the road. One thing is for certain – they definitely weren’t heading to Wings Over New Bedford.