GARDENERS, BE LOOKING UPWARD

SNOW GEESE,
Skagit flats
Packing their bags for their trip 
to the far north.
These photos courtesy of islander
Sally Vongsathorn,
 who was passing by mid-April 2023
(During Tulip Festival.)
Click images to enlarge. 
Three days later islander Ruthie Dougherty
 catches the Snow Geese flying NW
over Shaw Island,
San Juan Archipelago, WA.
See her video below.
Thank you gardeners for sharing these heart-thumps.

WILD GEESE WITH JACK MINER

"Wild geese pair off for life. I never knew them to even make an application for divorce. The male guards his mate on the nest. As soon as the young hatch, he protects them from the side opposite the mother, keeping the babies between the parents. He will leave his family for her and for her only, but he will die in the front ranks for any of them.  I have placed their bushels of corn around one of my mating pairs, and of the thousands of hungry geese that come here, none will interfere with these little plots to take even one kernel. 

When traveling in the air, the male Canada Goose leads the way, breaking the air for his sweetheart, who is quartering behind him, and his family travels next to her. In brief, he is one of the most self-sacrificing, godly-principled leaders the human eye ever beheld, and to know him is to love and admire him."

Jack Miner and the Birds: And Some Things I Know About Nature.

Below video was captured on 17 April 2023 by Ruthie Dougherty looking upwards from a forest on Shaw Island, WA.

Thank you, crew!