THE TRUE STORY OF WHITEGOOSE

Long ago, before modern farming and factories, geese provided many resources for humans.  Before turkeys became popular for Thanksgiving and other holiday feasts, geese were the primary choice.  There flesh was succulent and sweet.  Chicken was often called "the poor man's goose."

More than half the weight of a goose is pure fat.  People would often buy a brace(2 geese)  or two brace of geese for the family feast.  
The fat was prized for its use in making soaps and oil/tallow for candles, because just 100 years ago there was no electricity.  Goose fat was good for starting a fire, especially when wood brought in from the surrounding forest was wet.  Ointments were made from the fat, and rubbed into wax paper and applied to the chest area to relieve a myriad of respiratory problems, like bronchitis, and pneumonia.  The feathers were prized for making pillows, beds, and soft down quilts.  The longer feathers made excellent quills (the forerunner of our pens)..  .
 Whitegoose was a very smart goose. She did not want to end up on the  butcher's block. So one very dark night she escaped. It was during a  windstorm, and the fences had broken. The other geese were all in a  panic, they didn't want to escape, they just wanted to be safe and warm  from the wind, and they huddled together. Whitegoose wanted to be free.  She couldn't fly because the geese all had their wing feathers clipped to prevent them flying away.  So, she climbed over the backs of the geese and managed to jump to the top of a fence which had coils of barbed wire on the top.  A farm worker saw that she was about to make her escape so he clambered among the geese towards Whitegoose and came at her flourishing a long nasty whip which made her lose her balance.  She fell on the other side of the fence away from the farm worker, but the barbed wire had severly cut her right eye.  She ran and flapped into the forest, and was soon well away from the farm.  Tired and exhausted, with her eye badly torn, she collapsed and fell into a deep sleep.

When she awoke next morning, she could not see out of her torn eye, although there was no pain in it.  She did not know that her eye had been torn out at the barbed wire fence, and the socket was filling up with a soft white gel-like substance.  The sky was blue, however, and she was free,but hungry and thirsty.
 
 Whitegoose wandered a long way, and found a nice grassy field, with a stream beside it, and lots of bitter-sweet hard grass, which geese love. During the next few days she was happy to stay by the stream, but she was missing the other geese.  Occasionally she saw many Canada Geese high overhead on their way to somewhere, and she "honked" and honked" in vain for them to call in and visit her.  But they were busy looking for a good place to lay eggs and raise young Canada Geese and had no time to stop for a lonely white one-eyed goose who couldn't even fly.

Finally, Whitegoose sailed down the stream and came to Hatzic Lake, near Mission., British  Columbia. To her surprise the Lake had lots of Canada Geese families, with nests nearby.  The parents were constantly on the lookout for the great Bald eagles who nested on either side of the Lake who liked nothing better than baby geese for breakfast, but were satisfied with he numerous fish when they couldn't get baby geese, or ducklings.  For several years, Whitegoose stayed at the Lake, mainly babysitting and doing guard duty for the Canada Geese families.  Often an injured goose would drop out of the V-formation on the way south for the winter.   Whitegoose stayed behind all winter and cared for the injured geese.  A few survived enough to rejoin families the next spring.  
 
 Whitegoose ignored humans. There was a large RV resort close by where the geese gathered.  It was only populated during the warm summer months, and peaceful and quiet for the rest of the year.  She kept well away from the Resort in the summer as the children of the vacationers could be cruel, often throwing stones and sand at ducks and geese.  Ducks and Geese have an eyelid that comes up from the bottom of the eye, and they do not blink.  If a grain of sand gets into an eye, they become blind. Whitegoose knew she only had one eye and she was extremely cautious.  

One dark night, with a lovely bright moon as she was sailing by with a Canada Goose family, she saw a human standing at the end of a 
dock, which was jutting into the lake, and this person seemed to be calling her softly and  offering food. Cautiously she approached afer warning her Canada geese family stay well away.  Soon it became a regular habit to visit this person, even bringing her Canada Geese friends.  She visited often, even knocking on the door in the  morning for her breakfast, and rubbing her breast against the human's
 knees when human was sitting on the steps leading from a deck beside the RV.   She even "talked" with this human, although nobody could understand what was said.   She made clucking, whooshing, honking and clicky noises, while the  human just spoke words.
 
 One late November night, the human didn't come out to feed her. and she  felt something was wrong. She waited and waited, and then watched as someone helped her human out of the RV and into a car.   Strange, she must have thought,  my human didn't come down to feed or  pet me. 

(This story now continues in my own words).
 
 I ask myself, "Did she know I had or was having - a stroke"?
 
 She waddled up over the deck, and straight across to the passenger car
 door, making her clicking, wooshy noises. My helper had to push and chase
 her away although this caused me agony at the time.  I couldn't do a
 thing but watch helplessly, struggling to stay conscious.  Nothing seemed to be  for me.  I had no feeling on my right side, couldn't speak, or swallow,  and I kept  "blacking out"..
 
 Several days later, when I got back to the RV.  I was very weak and shaky, I had had a stroke.  Whitegoose was there to greet me.  She  waddled up tthe steps of the deck.  I was sitting down, and she was making lots of her chuckling noises, wagging her little tail from side to side like a dog, and pushing her big fat, wide breast against my knees.  She was feeling my face and hands with her strong orange beak, as delicate as a feather. 

During the winter we came out almost every weekend and left food for her and her injured geese (2 or 3).  She coud almost recognize the sound of my car, and when I stopped and got out and waved an arm to her, she would come flying right to me.  She never became friendly with anyone else.  But she avoided contact with other humans.  Many people at the Resort did not like her presence, and they were afraid for the children, but Whitegoose simply stayed away in the middle of the lake, or on the other side.  The Resort Caretaker's wife tried to get close to her, and Whitegoose took quite a chunk of flesh out of her knee when she cornered Whitegoose.  

She often attracted flocks of other geese, who would drop down to visit her (in droves), and it was quite a sight to see the Lake covered temporarily with hundreds and hundreds of Canada Geese, with Whitegoose flapping er wings, honking, and bossing everyone around from a strategic position in the middle of the gaggle of geese.

She once got a chunk of glass in her foot, and allowed me to ease it out, and bandage it, and it seemed to heal up, but she was left with a slight limp.  In the last year I saw her, she had attracted 3 other healthy, but young white geese.  They stayed with her awhile, but she was so "bossy" they eventually left her.
 
 During the "glass in her foot" incident, Whitegoose took very sick.   She limped badly down to the water's edge and curled up in a big ball and went to sleep late one afternoon.  The next day before noon, I noticed she hadn't moved  (she was all curled up with her head under her wing).  She was in "dying" mode.  That was when I found the glass in her foot, took it out and bandaged the foot.  I knew she had to get into the water and I fell into the water half-carrying her in, with her squawking, honking, and trying to flap her wings, but she never made any attempt to stab me with her big strong beak.  I fed her some, and I think I made her angry enoug to want to live.

To me the greatest thrill was when she flew towards me.  She came like a divebomber, and I always had to shut my eyes at the last minute.I was afraid she would stab me with her beak.  She always stopped, dropping her legs gently, with her beak less than half-inch from my nose. 
 
 She used to play in the water before my eyes, bathing and preening herself, sometimes doing somersaults, and/or playing with a red balloon buoy. Or a branch/stick. She often chased the ducks, or other geese.  Yet she was so gentle with the baby goslings of the Canada Geese families she tagged along with for babysitting and guard duties.

I had my stroke in November 1997, and she was my stroke helper every time I visited the Lake.  She made enough noise for me to have to go and feed her or otherwise attend to her.  She loved to show off when other geese visited her.

In Spring 1988 I missed her, but she often left for a few weeks, visiting other lakes.  She became quite confident, and liked to explore.

After a couple of months though when no geese at all came to the lake, and her absence seemed profound, I made some enquiries.

I learned that she had been killed by a speeding boat.  The kids were just having "a bit of fun."

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The Original Whitegoose

The Story of the Goose Girl by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm
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Click here for the story of God and the Geese 
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Click here for the story Lessons of the Geese
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Goose Books: at Amazon.com

I'll Gather My Geese 
by Hallie Crawford Stillwell 

My Goose Is Cooked: 
The Continuation Of A West Texas Ranch Woman's Story 
by Hallie Stillwell