Northeast has had its fill of Canada geese : It’s the fast-multiplying ‘resident’ variety, and the attendant feathers and droppings, that they loathe.

Susan Melcher recalls that there was a time, not too many years ago, that she was moved by the sight of Canada geese.

“I used to think they were stunningly beautiful,” Melcher said of the graceful, long-necked birds.

But that was before scores of geese began taking up residence along a pond next to her law office, fouling her yard and just about every other patch of greenery in the area. Now she has a different view of the geese: “They’re rats with webbed feet,” she said.

John Spillane, Walpole’s animal control officer, couldn’t agree more. Once, he enjoyed hunting the small numbers of geese that flew over the town each year. Today, he says scornfully, “They’re nasty, dirty birds.”

Such sentiments are heard often in suburban communities throughout southern New England and the mid-Atlantic states these days as the population of Canada geese surges. Once welcome guests, the tall dark birds now inspire much scorn as they invade seemingly every park, ball field, golf course and beach in the region.

“The problem is growing. A lot of people are frustrated,” said Laura Henze, director of the Agriculture Department program that oversees animal damage-control in Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island.

While geese are causing headaches in many parts of the country, nowhere is the problem more acute than in the Northeast, whose densely populated areas make bird-human coexistence particularly difficult.

The geese still have their admirers--remaining popular with wildlife enthusiasts who extol their beauty, and hunters and others who promote them as a source of top-quality, lean meat.

But Henze said that over the last few years, complaints about geese have been rising. Most concern the droppings and feathers they leave all over public areas. But there are also complaints about geese on airport runways, fouling water supplies and digging up crops.

And those problems are likely to get worse. Officials warn that over the next several years, Canada geese may become even more abundant in the Northeast, at least partly because of actions to manage the species.

The problem stems from the fact that there are actually two population categories of Canada geese in the region. One is made up of the traditional migratory flocks that nest in Canada during the summers and fly south for the winter. Those geese stop to feed during their journey south, settling primarily in the Chesapeake Bay region.

A second category does not migrate. Many of these “resident” geese are descended from birds once used as live decoys by hunters and released into the wild when such decoys were outlawed in 1935.

Over the years, the resident geese, which never learned to migrate, have multiplied in southern New England and the central Atlantic states--taking advantage of ideal habitat conditions, including relatively mild winters, freedom from predators and abundant open areas that offer the fresh water and tender grasses they require.

Federal regulators have been able to maintain some control by allowing states to offer limited hunting seasons. But this year, because of concern about a steep decline in the population of migratory geese from Quebec, authorities closed the regular goose hunting season on the East Coast, which normally runs from October to late December. Only limited hunting before and after the migration were allowed.

Authorities concede that by taking steps to safeguard migratory geese, they are also protecting overpopulated resident geese--since the two categories of Canada geese look nearly identical, the ban applies to all goose hunting. But they said data on the Quebec migratory flocks left them no choice but to impose the ban.

There are already 34,000 resident geese in Massachusetts, compared to less than 8,000 in 1970. Pennsylvania has as many as 200,000 resident geese, while New York has about 80,000 and Connecticut about 25,000.

Jerome R. Serie, an official with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said his agency would consider allowing additional hunting next year if data shows the migratory flocks are recovering. But he warned that hunting alone would not solve the problems, since many of the areas where geese have settled do not allow hunting. “The exponential growth of these residential birds is occurring because there’s a niche available to them in urban settings with ponds, golf courses and parks,” he said.

Many communities have experimented with methods other than regular hunting. They include prohibiting the feeding of birds, allowing grass to grow tall, building fences and frightening the birds with firecrackers, scarecrows or dogs. With federal permission, communities also are allowed to prevent goose eggs from hatching by puncturing or shaking them, and in special cases, to conduct kills.

Serie said his agency may give states more latitude to use such remedies. But many local officials say they see little hope of relief soon.

“They’re everywhere,” lamented Spillane, who estimates Walpole has as many as 400 geese. “Over the years, we’ve tried a few things, but nothing works,” he said. “You can scare them awhile, but they just come back.”