Peak District Retreat Blog: Wildlife and general news about the Retreat and its environment

Canada geese have returned this year to nest in precisely the same location as last year, on the bank of one of our ponds and near to our Green Tara statue.

The wider angle photo shows the general area of the pond. The zoomed in crop show the gander patrolling in the pond, with the female goose sitting on the nest on the far bank of the pond.

The gander is quite fierce so it is not possible to see how many eggs are in the nest. Just after the photo above was taken the gander rushed towards the female to chase away a crow that had landed nearby and was walking towards the nest, perhaps to steal eggs.

Three pairs of geese arrived several weeks ago. Initially they appeared to socialise but only this pair seemed to settle and nest. Thereafter, especially once the female started brooding the eggs, the presence of the others was not tolerated and the gander threatened and chased them. Even when they were 100m away they were chased, and we haven't seen them at all the last few days.

Look how big they are! Compare to when we first saw them 20 days ago.

There were and still are six goslings, though only four are captured on this photo taken as a quick snap from our window as they grazed outside.

They range far and wide, covering just about all of our 23 acres and also grazing on neighbouring farmland. We didn't see them at all for a couple of days but then they reappeared.

For a month we've been observing a male Canada goose patrolling all around the area of this pond, even walking up and down a field over 50 yards away to block cattle from coming near.

The nest was hard to spot but a couple of weeks ago we got glimpse between strands of tall grass of the white breast of the goose on the far edge of the pond.

We thought they were due to hatch and yesterday the goose left the nest and was swimming in the pond. This afternoon she brought six goslings into the pond with her.