Good for the Gander

For many of us, nothing heralds spring or autumn like the distant, airborne honking of Canada geese. You may be sitting in your backyard, outside at a coffee shop, or simply gathering your mail, and you hear it. Craning your neck to the heavens, you’ll see the V-formation, so high up you can’t help but be astonished that a bird can call so loudly, or fly so high.

So why would anyone who appreciates Canada geese want to keep them confined? This is the question Best Friends had to ask last summer when local authorities seized seven of them from a home in nearby Cedar City and brought them to the state- and federally licensed Wildlife Rehabilitation Center at Best Friends.

The four adult geese had been pinioned (that is, the tips of one of their wings had been lopped off), rendering them flightless. The three others, the juvenile offspring of the adults, were thankfully still intact. Problem was, how to give them the best care at a desert sanctuary when they belong near bodies of water? For the three flighted geese, it was a no-brainer: release them into a flock come the next migration. This is exactly what wildlife rehabilitator Carmen Smith and sub-permittee Barbara Weider did a few months ago at a reservoir not far from the sanctuary, a release that was conducted as a joint effort between Best Friends and the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources.

As for the pinioned geese, Carmen was able to find a home for them at the Tracy Aviary in Salt Lake City, the largest and oldest bird park in the U.S. There, the geese will live in a closer approximation to their natural environment than Best Friends can provide, and have plenty of fresh water to dip in. With their medical tests showing no signs of disease or illness, the geese got a clean bill of health, which should move them swiftly through the aviary quarantine process and into their new home in no time.

Story by Ted Brewer
Photo by Expectant Alchemist/Flickr