put the run on

expression, shoo away

“I can remember when we were kids, we’d all gather on our bicycles, eh, and then the boys’d have a few firecrackers or that, and they’d be out on the road. And then Dr. Smith’d come out and try and put the run on us, eh … We were just these little urchins from the rural area, you know, and of course the more he’d try and put the run on the boys, well the worse it got.”

“Still got a few swans, eh?”
“Yeah. Four or five of them hang in there pretty well all the time. I’ve seen fifty out there. They really take over the ducks, eh, put the run on the ducks and the geese. But lots of times you’ll see them right in amongst them.”