There's more to Canada geese than their droppings

VIRGINIA BEACH

When you mention Canada geese, most folks complain about how the geese are ruining the golf courses, messing up lawns and polluting neighborhood lakes.

Yet in most of the photos and reports you send of these handsome geese, they are doing what Canada geese do best – being good parents. There was a reason Mother Goose Nursery Rhymes got that name.

Canada geese are in the top tier of parents in the animal world.

For example, Mary Prier photographed a dedicated goose on a nest in the parking lot median across from the Tidewater Builders Association on Smith Avenue in Chesapeake. Prier is worried the eggs are no longer viable, but the mama goose won’t give up.

“She has been there through heat, storms, etc., for what seems like forever,” Prier said, “but still no chicks.”

Heather Short also sent sweet photos of goslings nestled under their mother goose in Linkhorn Park in Virginia Beach on Easter Sunday morning. The babes had hatched that day.

“In between egg hunts, we watched the mother goose with her babies,” Short wrote. “The following day the whole family was swimming in the creek. Very sweet.”

Woody Stephens sent a photo of a mother goose on her nest in the marsh in Thalia – and later of the mother and father goose escorting the babies through the neighborhood.

Unlike some other waterfowl species, father geese are not deadbeat dads. Connie Richeson reported a Canada goose nesting on an osprey platform off her home on Back Bay. The male swam protectively around the platform’s post while the female sat on the eggs.

You’ve got to hand it to the Canadas. They are the kind of mates and parents we need more of in this world.

They mate for life. Moms are diligent homemakers, tending the nest and caring for the eggs. And the dads stand by guarding the family and baby-sitting the eggs when Mom goes off to feed.

When the young hatch, Dad sticks with Mom, helping to keep the youngsters in line and to protect them from predators.

It’s not the geese’s fault that they are such pests to folks with lovely lawns and ponds. The geese are supposed to be far away in summer breeding grounds in Canada, not here.

But we humans messed up the Canadas’ migration pattern. It probably began in the late 1800s and early 1900s, when hunters domesticated Canada geese and kept them here year-round to use as live hunting decoys. The early geese began breeding, and the local youngsters didn’t have an instinct to migrate.

The Canada geese population continues to grow, fueled by humans eager to feed them and keep them fat and healthy. So with good lawn grass to nibble on and corn served up on a silver platter, the geese have a plush life here. Why migrate?

And the Canadas’ good parenting techniques haven’t hurt the population growth either.

CLOSE ENCOUNTERS

Dawn Davenport sent a photo of a wild rabbit in the grass in Fairfield. “I just love spring,” she said.

Jean Broughton in Morgan’s Walke snapped a little jumping spider devouring a moth.

Mike Potter in Highland Acres photographed a handsome young male summer tanager in his spring, tie-dyed coloring between youthful yellows and the bright red of full adult male summer tanagers. (See a photo of the tanager in the gallery on the left side of this webpage.) 

Bill Mitchell and several others have asked where the hummingbirds have gone. And Libby Morrison wonders where her goldfinches are.

The hummingbirds are probably few and far between because the females are on eggs now, and the goldfinch flocks have split up to pair off for their late breeding season.

Sherry Quiban at Munden Point photographed a daddy longlegs perched in a red flower. Quiban, who has contributed several photos to Close Encounters in the past, will have her first photography show June 1-30 at the Central Library. Also check out her website.

Bart Folta snapped a great blue heron with a frog in its mouth in Lago Mar.

Diane McClernon was upset to find a black rat snake inside her chickadee house. “The birds were having a noisy fit, and I felt sorry for them,” she said.

That’s really the dark side of the black snake! Last year someone sent me a photo of one with its head just resting on a hummingbird feeder waiting for a meal! The only saving grace is that this early in the year the chickadees should nest again.

Lynne Lindsay has just had a rerun of the nesting rotation last year in her Little Neck yard. A chickadee pair was nesting in a bird box when the house wren pair arrived. The day the chickadees fledged, the house wren was removing the nesting materials, and before you knew it, the wren was on eggs.

John Fitzpatrick in the Old Donation area photographed a tick he took off one of his dogs, and he wonders if it is just a dog tick or the new tick in town that causes Tidewater spotted fever. It looks a lot like both of them.

Rhonda Fleming in Etheridge Manor South sent great photos of parents at work – a robin with a big worm in its beak and a blue jay stuffing something yummy down the throat of a baby. (See a photo of the tanager in the gallery on the left side of this webpage.)

Karen Bisek sent photos of the ospreys that return each year to nest in front of her Bay Island home.

Nick Cirillo photographed a beautiful, lime green luna moth in Red Mill Farms, and Debbie Richards snapped one in Lake Placid. I blogged about them recently.

Joe Bouchard sent a photo of a green heron with its rusty brown shoulders hunting in the lake in Cypress Point. And Chuck Guthrie sent one of a great egret on the Lynnhaven River that he titled “Spring.”