Okay, Jonathan, now that I have vented my spleen, I will play nicely again. :) Regarding imprinting, here's how I see it... and others are welcome to disagree. Goslings have an instinctive tendency to attach themselves to the first creature(s) they see. In ideal circumstances, this is good old momma goose. They follow her and look to her for protection, guidance etc. She teaches them and if they get out of line, she corrects them - very firmly. One of the things the parent geese seem to teach their young is that humans should be kept at a little distance. "They may be nice creatures, little goslings, but they are NOT GEESE." :) Incubator goslings, or goslings removed from their parent just after hatching, have no mother goose to imprint on. Instead they have this human who feeds, waters, protects etc. So they attach themselves to this human. If the human responds by treating a gosling with all the handling and affection that one would accord to a puppy or kitten, the gosling grows up with no natural boundaries between it and the human. Some people feel such a goose lacks respect for humans. I'm not sure this is exactly the right word... but it's close. It certainly lacks inhibitions regarding its behaviour toward the human. When breeding season rolls around, along about the following February, the geese - and particularly the ganders - are suddenly flooded with hormonal urges. If the gander lacks the inhibitions that would normally keep him at a safe distance from human "intruders" he MAY vent his over-protectiveness and possessiveness of his lady by attacking the very humans who nurtured him -- or any others that venture too near. A goose-raised gander may normally hiss and snake his neck to warn people to keep away while he and his lady raise their young, but a hand-raised gander is more likely to go further than that, and bite and/or flog the human with his wings. It hurts plenty... and if this happened to a small child, serious damage could be done. This being said, goose behaviour even during the breeding season is influenced by the underlying disposition of the individual bird. And this inborn disposition MAY be affected by genetics. Hence one breed gets good reviews (particularly Pilgrims and American Buffs) whereas certain others (particularly the Asian breeds which are not descended from the European greylag) have a reputation for aggressiveness. Certain breeds, and the Pilgrim is one of them, have been selectively bred for good dispositions, making it less likely that they will be aggressive as they mature. In addition to this, Pilgrims are auto-sexing and even a beginner can tell the males from the females at a glance. This makes it much easier to be more reserved in one's handling of the ganders in particular. Last year, when I added a pair of Pilgrim goslings to the mixed breed family my two geese were raising, I took pains not to handfeed or pet the gander gosling. He was naturally reserved and I encouraged him to stay that way. I think the only time we picked him up or even touched him was once when we saw blood on his feathers and needed to check the extent of the injury. The female gosling was more friendly and when we had the geese out in the pasture for extra grazing she soon followed her foster mother's example and learned to take dandelion greens from my hand. I don't do this a lot with her; but Willow, (my first Pilgrim who was of necessity hand-raised) comes looking for attention from time to time. She is a sweetheart even during breeding season and Elsie follows her example. I do believe that one has more leeway with female geese than one has with ganders, but even Willow does not appreciate me handling her goslings when they are small. (And I respect this, except when necessary to return a gosling that has squeezed under the fence or otherwise needs rescuing. Even then Willow can be quite huffy about it... but not aggressive.) Get me talking about my geese and I can go on and on... but I think that is enough to add at the moment. Please understand that these are subjective observations from a person who has just over two years experience with geese and that the sample of geese I have worked with has been a mere dozen. What I am doing with my geese now is working well for me and for the geese. They are friendly, but not lap geese. They are always glad to see us and give us a loud, joyous welcome; they know their names and will come when called (if they feel like it). Willow, with her winning ways and extremely sweet nature, is ALMOST a pet. The other two are not. But all of them enrich our lives, make us smile or shake our heads at their antics, and are altogether very satisfactory creatures to have about the place.

Beth, you and your geese are very welcome... It was just a blind guess about the snapper, but for once I was right on the money. Now it looks as though Coldiron has a similar problem. If you want to train your geese to go to the barn, I suggest you start soon. Make them work a little for the treats. Reward them for walking with you. Pick a cheery little song and make it their travelling music. My geese walk with me to a version of "Three little ducks that I once knew" expcept it's "Nine little geese" and I improvise the lyrics. Thank goodness the neighbours are not too close and are a whole lot weirder than I am! When I put them in for the night, I march them to "Row, row, row your boat" and it really does help get them into their house. For your geese, I suggest one song for everything. Sing it when they are coming to you for treats, when they follow your for more treats and work a little closer to the barn once they get the idea. If you feed them grain or pellets at night, work the dish closer and closer to the barn too. By the time winter comes, they will trust you enough (I hope) for you to be able to sing them right into the barn for the cold nights. Geese are also fairly easy to herd. Don't rush them or they will scatter in a panic, but keep a slow, even pressure on them. A long stick in either hand (I use my cane) will make your left/right signals clearer to them. If you want them to go to the left, raise your right arm. If you wan tthem to go right, raise your left. Both arms extended equally and they will go more or less straight forward. It takes a little practice, but it is comforting to know that you can move them away from danger if necessary... or even make them go into the barn in really bad weather. Sheila, I'm glad you would like some Pilgrim eggs. We must do this. It would be lovely to think that some of "my" geese were in your keeping. Also, from a conservationist point of view, it would please me very much to get those genes in as many places as possible. Pilgrims are such super geese but they will be in a bad way unless their gene pool can be maximized. My Willow is of Californian stock, a bit short in the legs but a lovely little goose even so. Ben and Elsie are breeder/show quality from Holderread's via my local hatchery. With all the travel expenses, the pair cost me CDN $75. (They went by air from Oregon to Buffalo and then travelled by car from Buffalo to Prince Edward County. They were only 24 hours in transit and were not stressed when they arrived.) Worth every cent...They look really good and should produce good goslings.

Cats and birds have been around for a long time but cats have not been fed and cultured the way we do now. Larger predators have been removed until this rebirth of coyotes. Balance is a hard thing to maintain. Human intervention of the food chain is all over the place and sometimes further intervention is called for and sometimes less is called for. I have been asked by "my" biologist who has designed my wildlife plan to BE the predator that brings the land back in balance. I don't like it, but it has been suggested to kill Racoons,, stray feral cats, deer, and FIRE ANTS. They are all out of balance. I know my neighbors' cats that live close to me., but there are 2 places that have 30+ cats. One old man who used to buy 40lbs of cat food a week died a year or so back and , oh lordy, were we trapping some sorry mean cats that inundated us and taking them down to the shelter. I have another guy who lives about 1/4 mile from me who has at least 30 cats hanging at his house. They make it over here and we try to scare them off. My cats are past their hay day of hunting. They don't bring down anything. Even the lizards pay the little mind. The cats do like the field mice and the rabbits. I see a family of really fleet whiptails that have moved in. The coon population has dwindled because of our activity and the foxes have replaced them. They are much more in balance. The coyotes are working on those cats. I hear them at night. My cats stay inside at night. I tried being a cowbird predator but that didn't work out too well. The rather large trap is at my neighbors house raising chickens. My neighbors got rid of their cows and we don't see the cow birds now. The deer are a hard nut to crack. Our land is weirdly shaped and the place they love to hang is by the road and hunting them is dangerous for passing traffic. We do have a mountain lion on occasion. Then , all the deer get scarce in a hurry and I start feeling like I am on the menu when I go run the trash out in the night time with my long mag light grasped tightly. I have heard it roar. We have boars. The lions killed 2 400lb boars a couple of years ago and my neighbor shot 4 of them last summer. They can root up ground in a hurry.I wish I could channel that energy in the spring, I wouldn't need a tractor to plow over a field. We do have wildlife in disarray. The boars do damage, the deer are making once common trees endangered. I am doing my best caging tree seedlings and watering them in the summer when we have no rain. Lately there have been no seedlings making it through the summers because of the drought. I have been revegetating and diversifying flora and fighting invasives. It is a big pill.

Pal, I can't think of an answer because I can't quit chuckling. It just figures if I posted that someone would post what you did. LOL. Didn't mean to offend but everyone has different taste and I always hated those pictures with a passion. Tell you what -- if someone ever gives me one I'll be more than happy to send it to you with my best wishes.