Thursday 22 December 2016

Greylags

A gaggle of a dozen or so greylag geese have taken up residence in some of the croft fields below the road in Ormsaigbeg. Only the fields with well-cropped grass will do for them, and there are some fields they won't use because they remember that the crofter has a gun.

They fly reluctantly, these two lifting into the air in the semi-dark at nine this morning, but then....

....the flock only flew as far as the bottom of the neighbouring field.

We've seen fewer greylags around this winter. Last year there was a large flock in the field beyond Mingary Castle. While the greylag is a year-round species in Britain, many of the winter greylags are migrants from Iceland and Scandinavia.

They were at the top of the field again at lunch time and didn't feel comfortable with our proximity, waddling quite quickly down the field watching us all the time. Finally they decided they didn't trust us so....

....they took off again, but this time they flew out across Kilchoan Bay and landed on the water.

3 comments:

  1. Does anybody shoot and eat them? I met someone who'd shot and cooked a Canada Goose. He said it was almost inedible - tough and tasted of mud.

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  2. Yes. I gather that they take some skilled cooking. Jon

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  3. Hopefully on Sunday our Aldi Goose will be better:-)

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