No magic, after all

I promised goslings. Like magic, I said. Happens every year. Sadly, there will be no goslings in 2008.

This year followed the normal pattern at first: hundreds of geese in the winter, with a pair remaining through the spring. Unlike past years, the couple chose to nest in plain view. Mama started spending her days on the nest, which was right at the edge of the pond. Papa took up sentry duty, staking his claim to the entire pond and chasing off anything that came near. The poor ducks had to make do with a few nearby puddles.

Papa was just starting to relax and allow us to pass through the area when suddenly the pair disappeared, leaving behind a nest with visible signs of disturbance.

A closer look at the lower part of the nest reveals a damaged egg:

The couple returned the next day, but one of appears to have an injured leg. A fox, perhaps? We don't know, but I'll really miss watching them raise their young this spring.

And then there were two ...

Our Canada Goose population has dwindled from hundreds, just a couple months ago, to two. I'm not alarmed, this happens every year, and is a harbinger of spring. What happens next is even better: by the end of April there will be goslings!

The goslings appear like magic every year. We have never seen mating behavior, or a nest. This completely surprised me four years ago, but now it has become an annual event. We suspect this pair of geese has been here before. They don't raise a fuss when we come out to the pond, and when we feed the ducks they actually walk over to grab some morsels for themselves! I wish I knew more about this pair: how old they are, whether they were born here, or if they raised young here last year. In any case, the annual cycle never ceases to amaze me.

Stay tuned ...

Just passing through ...

This morning we added a new species to our bird list: the American Wigeon. There were three males and a female, dabbling about on the pond. Their characteristic markings and blue-ish beak gave them away. We're seeing lots of interesting new visitors this time of year, like last weekend's Snow Geese and some Hooded Mergansers. They seem to be just passing through, stopping to rest and eat and then make their way to their next destination.

Photo courtesy of eNature.

Weekend visit from a pair of Snow Geese

A pair of Snow Geese decided to crash this weekend's Big Goose Party. They were first spotted on Friday, strutting about about in a flock of Canada Geese. One is pure white; the other is the Blue Goose variety (located to the far left of the white goose in the photo).

Saturday morning they were back, this time on the pond. At first I thought they were our Pekin ducks, but a quick beak count proved otherwise. Eager to get a shot of something other than their posteriors, I tried stealing down to the pond for more photos, but despite my zeal failed to capture them. Either I missed the birds entirely, or the shot was an unfocused blur. Eventually I managed to scare them all off. To really show off how fine these birds are, the best I can do is this photo, courtesy of eNature's entry on the Snow Goose:

The flock has returned to the pond several times over the course of the weekend. The Snow Geese are quite beautiful!

A week of ups and downs for our backyard wildlife

A couple months ago I wrote about one of our ducks' strange meanderings. A few weeks ago this very same duck started spending a lot of her time in the duck house. She didn't even come out for food. It turned out she was sitting on two eggs. While all of our ducks are quite enthusiastic when it comes to mating, and pretty good at producing eggs, the eggs tended to be left lying wherever they were laid: the front garden bushes, deep in the pond, along the bank, you name it. Up to now, none of the ducks seemed to have the faintest idea about nesting.

Well, this mama duck managed to master the nesting thing and on Monday, hatched two fuzzy black ducklings. It was exciting, but we were apprehensive at the same time. Would she know what to do next? Would they get enough food? Would they be warm enough?

We watched them carefully on Monday and Tuesday, bringing water and some ground duck pellets out to the duck house each day. On Wednesday, she ventured forth with her brood. A bit of drama ensued. Mama duck took the little ones out for a swim, and then proceeded to take them to one of her favorite spots for sitting: the pond's overflow grate. Her spatial relationship skills proved even more suspect than her parenting skills, as one of the ducklings fell through the grate! There was much flapping and panicked quacking, which fortunately caught Chris' attention. He realized what had happened, went into the woods behind the pond, crawled through a wet and spidery culvert, retrieved the little fella, and reunited it with mama duck (all this was even more remarkable given that Chris is all trussed up in a contraption designed to heal a broken clavicle ... but that's another story!).

All seemed well from that point. Mama took her little ones out during the day, and retired to the safety of the duck house in the early evening. On Friday night we went out to visit the little ones and enjoyed watching them splash about. But in the middle of the night, we heard a lot of panicked quacking coming from all 8 ducks. This chorus is usually reserved for really scary and threatening situations. In the morning, the ducks were all clustered together on the grate. But the ducklings were gone.

I know the deck is stacked against ducklings born this time of year, since they are unlikely to reach a suitable body weight before the weather gets cold. But they were so cute and fluffy. It's sad.

Pasture, pond, and other developments

There has been a lot of activity around our property this spring. Chris has enlarged the pasture area by clearning more -- wait for it -- multiflora rose. We have come to realize that all of the lovely, "wooded" areas of our property are covered in multiflora rose that has slowly but surely strangled & killed off many, many trees. Clearing rose and dead trees has been Chris' raison d'etre for several weeks now. The goal is to have a clear view from our house, beyond the pond, into the pasture where we will keep our two horses. Here's a what the view looked like before this project started, in winter & in summer:


Our ducks are still around, but far fewer in number. Their survival skills are not very strong, and many have fallen victim to foxes. As of this writing, the "beak count" stands at 8: 2 pekins, 3 khaki campbells, and 3 cayugas. Canada geese fare much better. Over 3 winters we've come to expect large numbers of geese for Christmas, a couple pairs in the spring, and 8-12 goslings every year. They're wonderful!

2005: Beginnings of a wildlife habitat

In 2005, we decided to introduce more "wildlife" to our property and purchased several baby ducks (pekins, cayugas, and khaki campbells). We kept them captive until they were a few months old, and then decided to release them into the pond. This was easier said than done! We naively thought that after opening their enclosure they would march in a neat parade down to the water. Instead they took off in all different directions, ending up deep in weeds and multiflora rose. One by one we extracted the ducks and carried them down to the pond. They were slightly shocked, but quickly got over it and began to enjoy their new habitat, including a wonderful duck house built by Chris.


Most of the geese that visited over Christmas left in early spring, but a couple pairs stuck around and then one day, there were families! Goslings had arrived! We have also been thrilled by visits from a blue heron, who really enjoys hanging out by the pond.