Beautiful geese

After months of waiting eagerly, I was finally able to get my first geese the other day. A beautiful young pair of Embden and a young pair of Brown Chinese from Tim at Tribe of Honk.

This is one of the Embden, a bit muddy as it's not had a chance to visit the dam.

The little Chinese looking very elegant... the above picture also shows an Aylesbury behind it (the white splotch) and the Faverolle boy in the background.

The problem of bringing out a camera when chooks are aware that photographing them equals treats!

There is a bit of a shadow over their homecoming as when I released them from the crate, it's mate took off in a panic and made it to the dam. Since we couldn't get it off the water, we hid behind the shed thinking it'd come out and we could then shoo it toward the shed. When we peeped back out a few mins later it was gone - not in the dam, not in the field or adjoining fields. I've spent all night combing our property and yesterday and today looking everywhere, putting flyers out, knocking on doors, posting signs, newspaper etc. What a thing to loose one of your new babies less than 10 minutes after arriving home. :-( Several neighbors have flocks though so I'm hoping the quickness of it disapearing means it heard someones birds and took off to them and we'll hear from them when they find a new goose there.