_Our Model Canada Goose._
While I am writing as plainly as I dare, yet I want you to keep an eye
between the lines.
For two springs in succession, two pairs of my geese nested on the bank
of the north pond, just one hundred and twenty feet apart, each gander
always guarding and never going thirty feet away. An old goose I had in
my flock apparently couldn’t control nature and she went and built a
nest on the bank right between these two pairs of geese, or about sixty
feet from each nest. These ganders did not interfere with her in any
way, shape, manner or form; but if an enemy approached her, both these
ganders would leave home and would attack him with fury, while if you
went near either of their nests, only the one would fight you; the other
would stay at home. Both years every egg in their nests hatched, and the
young were hearty and strong. This odd, or single, goose set for five
weeks on four eggs the first year, and I let her set seven weeks on five
eggs the second year. I broke every egg, and not one showed any sign of
fertility. Remember, this is not almanac history; these are the facts,
as I know them.
Do these geese inbreed? This is a question that apparently bothers a
great percentage of us smart human beings, and often in the spring of
the year when the geese are sitting around by the hundreds I hear this
question asked by all sorts of visitors; I think this is chiefly because
of the extreme uniformity of these birds both in size as well as in
color.
I have tested this out sufficiently to satisfy all my curiosity. I went
so far as to keep four full brothers and sisters in an inclosure by
themselves for nearly three years, and they lived together as brothers
and sisters only. But March the third year I heard the two geese giving
love-sick cries and they kept fighting the wire towards where some
wing-clipped ganders were. So I opened the gate and let them together,
and inside of two weeks they paired off with these strange ganders.
A young goose will lay four eggs the first year, and usually five the
second. After that I have had them lay as high as seven, but in their
wild state I know they must lay as high as eight for I quite often see
an unbroken family here with ten in it, eight young and the parents; but
six is the average brood of young.
During my life I have often crept upon a deer or peeped over the top of
a hill at a moose, and with the frosty air in my favor I have watched
them fully three-quarters of an hour, or until I got froze out, just
drinking in pure nature. Time and again I have taken a little twig in my
fingers and cracked it, and I am sure the deer’s hearing is at least
three times as sharp as ours, or what I might hear at twenty feet the
deer would hear at sixty feet; but the hearing of the moose is not as
sharp as that of the deer, nor their eyes as quick to locate one. Of all
the creatures that carry the latest electric equipment with them I know
of none to compare with the Canada goose. One bright, frosty day in
January, when the snow was about six inches deep, my wing-tipped geese
were out of the wind with their feet pulled up. There they sat on the
crusty snow like so many fireless cookers. I called them to dinner, but
they replied “Bring it to us.” When I would toss three kernels of wheat
in the air all would honk, but when I went through the same motion,
empty-handed, they would not answer. I stepped the distance and it was
over three hundred feet. I am sure these birds saw the three grains of
wheat that distance.
But there is no branch in my nature study that has caused me to sit up
and take a more bubbling-over, sympathetic interest than to see these
poor maimed birds come to me for protection when they really need it. I
have seen as high as six lying in front of my dining-room window at
once; in fact, I have picked up as high as seven in one spring that came
here and died of their wounds. What touches my heartstrings more than
ever is that the wounded ones always come to the park pond and usually
sit on the side nearest our house. Possibly while we are eating dinner
one will stand with his breast toward us and dress the wound made by a
buckshot in his breast; then to get him closer we put the field-glasses
on him, which show the details; and here the feathers are all fallen out
for fully a half inch around the deadly, dark little hole that is
causing him so much inward pain and leaving his life hanging in the
balance. I tell you any humane being having a heart and actually knowing
the facts about these poor creatures needn’t be surprised to find his
eyeballs sweating.
And to see how they heal their broken legs is still more interesting. On
April 2nd, 1915, a leader of a family of eight came home with one leg
hanging down which was undoubtedly broken by a large buckshot. He had no
more control over it than he would have of a stick tied to him. When he
lit I noticed he hovered until he got the right spot, then he lowered
away and came straight down into the water. There he stayed with head up
and watched until his family went and fed. Then, while they watched, he
rose straight up and hovered until he located the ear of corn preferred;
he then carefully lowered, and turning the ends of his wings sidewise
for crutches, he let his body carefully down, leaving his broken leg
straight out beside his tail. Then reaching out with his long neck he
pulled the ear of corn under his breast and piggled the kernels off
until he had sufficient. He then put his wings out again, making
crutches of them, and with a peculiar spring he was in the air and came
down in the pond as before. On the third day he was standing on the bank
with his broken leg straightened around in place, and from a distance he
looked to be standing perfectly still, but a close investigation showed
there was a constant twitching in the broken limb. We timed him, and
this dear old father stood exactly in the one spot and in this same
position for over six hours at a time. In less than three weeks it was
evident that the bones had knit together, for when he would alight on
the ground he would just throw himself a little to one side and let his
weight down on the one leg; as he walked he would put his game leg
through the motion, just touching the toes to the earth, taking the
weight off with a short, quick stroke of the wings. The fourth week he
ceased to use his wings for assistance, but would put his foot down and
go limping across the lawn. During all this time of his untold suffering
and agony, this admirable creature never ceased his duty, but kept a
constant watch over his loved ones and if the least thing happened out
of the ordinary around the premises he would speak quietly to them about
it. Exactly one month from the day he came here, wounded, he led his
family very high and they all floated away on the air, headed for the
North.
The above is only one out of dozens of cases that have come to my
observation. Out of the thousands of Canada geese I have closely
examined, I have never seen one with a leg or foot healed crosswise, and
there are always odd ones, here with broken legs. We have seen one or
two with one leg a little shorter than the other. In that case the other
leg is always a little the longer.
I know of no bird or animal that can equal them for getting well after
being wounded. It is said that a cat has nine lives; if that be true,
the Canada goose has at least eighteen, nine on each side of the border.
In March, 1912, a wounded goose came to our park, rested a while in the
water, then walked quietly towards the house and finally lay down, its
feathers touching the park fence, just exactly thirty feet from our
dining room window. I went out to it. She would not let me pick her up,
but would allow me within four feet of her. That night it snowed fully
six inches, and she drifted nearly all under but her head. I looked and
thought she was dead, so I went up to her, upon the opposite side of the
fence, and she did not move. I opened the gate and approached, but
before I got within ten feet of her she awakened and would have flown
but that I withdrew. (Notice how she knew I was now inside the
inclosure.) Well, that goose did not move ten feet for three days,
eating a little snow now and then that had drifted there. I threw
shelled corn beside her and she ate a few kernels. As the bank of snow
had all melted on the fourth day, she walked to the water and drank, but
came right back and lay down. But in about three weeks she was going
over the top again. This goose had no limbs broken, but was shot through
the body.
One of the most encouraging facts that have been demonstrated by my
experiments with these most intelligent creatures is how readily and
gladly they will come to man for his protection, or how easily this
promise of our heritage is confirmed: “Let man have dominion over all.”
Previous to 1919 our Canadian Government ignored all the requests my
friends and I made to help me feed these birds, which belong to the
people of America; and as I am not a man with means, I just feed them
enough to tickle their palates and give them a desire to come back. The
result is they scour the country for miles around, getting the ears of
corn that are mostly knocked off by the corn-binders. This of course
gives the shooter an opportunity, and one day in April a neighbor who
was ploughing near by saw a single goose. He noticed it was going very
slowly and showed signs of weakness, so he stopped and watched it.
Instead of rising over the trees and dropping in the pond, it went under
the boughs and came to the ground near the house. Little Jasper, who was
then three years old, was outside playing. Running in the house he said
to his mother, “Mamma, goose out here; goose out here, mamma.” His
mother saw by his looks and actions there was something out of the
ordinary, so she went out with the little tot and he pointed under a
spruce tree, the boughs of which touched the house. And there the goose,
with her wings spread, lay dying. They called me from the factory, but
when I arrived it was stone dead. On examination I found a buckshot hole
under the wing, and it was evident that her “powerhouse” was punctured.
The clotted blood on one foot proved to my satisfaction that she had
been shot fully five minutes previous to dropping. Then I traced the
blood back from where I picked her up and found that she lit within ten
feet of our back door, for there, on the brick walk, was a big splash of
her blood. In a few hours I found that this goose was shot over five
miles away.
Do you wonder at me loving them? Can you blame me for feeding them
beyond my means, when this is only a faint, roughly-written picture of
their trust and confidence in me?
The real home of love is the heart, but the brain is apparently given
power to educate the heart to either love or hate. But any man who does
not love those who first love him, I don’t think has either heart or
brains, and to say he even has a gizzard would be a disgrace to these
birds.