Geese in Flight

[yourlibrarian]

The above photo is unfortunately the only one from when my SO witnessed a goose slapdown last weekend. While out for a walk he noticed a group of 5 geese across the street. Two were fighting viciously while 3 stood around. Then the geese flew across the street to his side, so low that they were nearly hit by a car.

Undaunted by their near miss they went back into the middle of the street, fighting, and then went onto the sidewalk. One goose continued attaching another, standing on it and pulling feathers off its back. He was alarmed and approached them and hissed at the geese. He said the attacking goose stopped, surprised, and as he kept doing so it flew off, leaving the other goose to wander around for a bit before it, too, flew off.



He also shot the above photo during another walk, which I thought was a stunning view of geese in the lot next door after the snow had melted into a near-pond.

Sadly I also did not get shareable photos of the groundhog I spotted recently. I was too far away with only my phone camera and it was skittish. In all the time we've been here I think it's only the 3rd one I've seen.

While I'm sharing photos, here are a few more. In the first one, I like how the lake turned purple.



This was another shot of the sunset just before the color disappeared from the sky.

Comments

[yourlibrarian]

I was surprised too because the geese have been around these parts since we moved here and I have had aggressive geese chase me. The idea that he'd be able to do so by approaching and hissing was unexpected. But then they were busy fighting one another so perhaps he seemed one challenger too many?

(I have found though that an open umbrella is enough to get them on the run).