Goose watch

Once again there's little to report from our day today: Stuart went up to Lanciole for the morning, and I spent the day in the office. We walked Reggie along the San Lorenzo path this evening so that we could combine his walk with a visit to the Phillipses' chickens. Because there are private houses (and gardens), the odd car, the odd cyclist and the odd jogger along the San Lorenzo path, we have to keep Reggie on the lead. This is becoming a bit of a nightmare though: he knows that along the path there are three different spots in which he meets other dogs (in their gardens) plus a house where there are usually a couple of cats to pique his interest. This means that from the minute we set out, he pulls on the lead, desperately trying to get ahead and find his "friends". It's noticeable that once we've passed all of those distractions he pulls a lot less. Anyway, his pulling is both awkward for us and uncomfortable for him - so we're wondering whether we will have to strike that walk off our list, which is a shame.

Anyway, the main point of note for today is a goose update. Since it seems that Mrs Goose really is sitting on a clutch of eggs, but hasn't moved for several days (at least not that we have witnessed), the advice from Backyard Chickens was to try to get her off the nest for a short while to move around, have a drink and some food before letting her back on it again. The advice was to put the food and water immediately outside the house, get her out of the house and close it so that she couldn't get back in again, before letting her back in after 30 minutes or so.

Stuart duly went up to Goose Island this afternoon to do some goose husbandry. After hissing at him (up until now, the female has never hissed), she staggered up off the nest and wobbled to the door - well, after 5 days or so sitting down, she probably had pins and needles never mind the fact that she almost certainly hasn't been eating or drinking properly! He managed to shut the door and left the goose enclosure just as she was having a good long drink of water. 30 minutes or so later, he went back to re-open the goose house and found her splashing around in the pond having a good bath. When we next looked though, both geese were back inside the house, with Mrs Goose firmly back on the nest.

We are told that we need to try to make getting Mrs Goose off the nest for 20-30 minutes a daily routine so that she eats, drinks, bathes and gets her circulation going, so it looks like that will be a new daily task for us for the next few weeks at least! We don't know exactly when the eggs were laid, but the incubation period is around 30 days, so we estimate it could be another 2-3 weeks. We'll keep you updated!