Lowly Geese

A few nights ago I was in the outdoor tub, soaking and relaxing. I heard the overhead honk of Canada geese. We love to hear them when they are migrating (north in March and south in October), when they fly at high altitudes, in groups of a couple dozen and more. Their flying V is amazing to watch. A flock can be heard for half a minute or more before they come into sight; many of the geese honking constantly and encouragingly. If we are indoors when we hear them coming, we run outside and look up, to watch the V fly on by.

I have come to think that their honks are intended either to urge the leader on, knowing that it takes much more energy to fly point, or to scold those who allow themselves to fall a little out of the slip stream of the perfect V shape.

But we also hear them, every other week or so, all year long. (Some Canada geese are year-round residents.) There is a pond close by, from which they fly, and back to which they fly, in the mornings and evenings. We will hear a small number of them honking—quite close and low—as they circle and head in for a landing on the pond.

I thought, as I was sitting in the tub, that I was hearing a couple of them making that last swoop down for the night, to settle on the pond. I looked up, hoping to watch them cross the clearing above me. In the next instant I was startled by a V of some 15-20 geese, flying very low and immediately overhead. The V was perfectly shaped, as if each goose knew its exact position in the aerodynamically-efficient line. If I had been able to take a picture, I could have drawn a straight line with a ruler on the photo, down each side of the V, exactly intersecting the nose of each goose. As they flew directly overhead, they halted their honking for a moment. They were so low that I could hear their wings flapping—all in perfect synchronicity. A "whish, whish, whish", and then they were gone. I sat there stunned—trying to soak in what I just saw and heard.