We received several phone calls this afternoon about a female Canada Goose who chose to nest and lay eggs in an odd location…in a commercial parking lot in Golden Valley. A local news station took photos and video of the goose and posted them on their website this afternoon, prompting many concerned calls to WRC. Many questions were posed about whether she should be relocated or left alone.

The best thing to do in this case is to leave her be. She chose to nest there for a reason, and disturbing her could cause the loss of her eggs, and would also stress her out greatly since she is very defensive at this time. Employees at the business where she layed her eggs have placed orange cones around her to prevent cars from parking next to her, and will be watching her closely over the next few weeks. They even placed potted plants around her to give her a bit more privacy. The Minnesota DNR has been contacted and they made the same recommendation; to leave her alone and let her carry on with her motherly duties.

The incubation period for Canada goslings is about 28 days. The goslings are born precocial, which means they are feathered, eyes open, and able to walk, eat/drink on their own, etc. When all the eggs are hatched, they will instinctively follow mom to water. Both parents will stay with the goslings until they migrate this fall.

Sometimes it’s best to just let nature take its course. We wish this momma the best of luck and hope that she can sucessfully incubate her young.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 9th, 2010 at 11:02 pm and is filed under Vet Leslie's Posts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.