Hengal, I replied on HT but it occurs to me now that 6' x 8' is not a very big space if you are only moving it once a day. I had a pen about 10' x 10' last year for three goslings and had to move it two or three times a day to keep them in good forage and to prevent damage to the turf. Geese make good use of weeds such as clover, dandelions and plantain as well as grass and the variety does them good. Any chance you could move the pen more often or perhaps let them out as soon as you get home so they can get in some extra foraging? Geese go through a ravenous stage as they are beginning to feather out, but a little later her appetite may calm down some. It is just a case of getting enough greens into her to keep her from needing too much concentrate. Another possibility is to gather extra greens - dandelions, clover etc. - break them up a bit to prevent choking and dump them into the pen to supplement what they can get. It is not as time consuming as it sounds, provided you have some areas that are not manicured. Another thought... do you provide supplemental granite grit? I know that they get some from the ground itself, but a bag of "grower" grit is only a few dollars and a good insurance against digestive difficulties. Nothing to do with the wing problem, but a good idea anyway.

Kimmsr, I don't think you read my original email. The maggots have only been in my pile on two occasions: directly from llama manure and now from my "slop" buckets that I left in the heat a few weeks because I hadn't built up my new working pile. But well, it seems like one has to come to expect the bloody Spanish Inquisition on this forum ;-) And the reason I tarped to try to kill the flies was because I have an "urban" pile with close neighbors parking nearby my pile, and intrusive city building department quick to send out letters. Anyway, this forum used to be more fun, I wish folks would lighten up.

Bromus generally isn't considered an ornamental grass. You might get more action in a more appropriate forum.

My first thought was to say blackbirds, but I don't think there are any blackbirds, even immature ones, with very distinctive spots like that. Could they be starlings? Check out the link below. There's good info on the Identification and the Life History tabs. If it's either blackbirds or starlings, they're both nuisance birds. Will eat you out of house and home--and seed, and very "dirty" birds---a/k/a: poop all over the place! I haven't seen any starlings around here, but for the last couple weeks I've had a HUGE herd of brewer's blackbirds around. Couldn't keep 'em chased away no matter what I did! They'd fly up into the trees and sit up there laughing at me till I came back inside! Had to finally let the feeders "big birds" can access get empty and just stay that way! In the last couple days they seem to have disappeared again. The one possible problem I see with yours being a starling is that they have yellow beaks and in the pic it looks like yours has a black beak. Maybe that's just the pic! The "top" bird on the birdbath looks like a robin to me--right shape and has its head up like they do when they're drinking, but the pic is too dark to be sure of anything. Here's a link to the brewers blackbird so you can do some checking if/when they come back. These two pages also link to other "similar species." If you don't have a bird book--or two, Cornell All About Birds is a great site to look them up! http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Brewers_Blackbird/id Hope this helps you, Skybird Here is a link that might be useful: European Starling - All About Birds