The Geese of Beaver Bog

by Bernd Heinrich

When award-winning writer and biologist Bernd Heinrich became the unwitting -- but doting -- foster parent of an adorable gosling named Peep, he was drawn into her world. And so, with a scientist's training and a nature lover's boundless enthusiasm, he set out to understand the travails and triumphs of the Canada geese living in the beaver bog adjacent to his home. In The Geese of Beaver Bog , Heinrich takes his readers through mud, icy waters, and overgrown sedge hummocks to unravel the mysteries behind heated battles, suspicious nest raids, jealous outbursts, and more. With deft insight and infectious good humor, he sheds light on how geese live and why they behave as they do. Far from staid or predictable, the lives of geese are packed with adventure and full of surprises. Illustrated throughout with Heinrich's trademark sketches and featuring beautiful four-color photographs, The Geese of Beaver Bog is part love story, part science experiment, and wholly delightful.

Genres: Animals, Nature, Nonfiction, Birds, Science, Science Nature, Natural History

240 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Bernd Heinrich was born in Germany (April 19, 1940) and moved to Wilton, Maine as a child. He studied at the University of Maine and UCLA and is Professor Emeritus of Biology at the University of Vermont.

He is the author of many books including Winter World, Ravens in Winter, Mind of the Raven, and Why We Run. Many of his books focus on the natural world just outside the cabin door.

Heinrich has won numerous awards for his writing and is a world class ultra-marathon runner.

He spends much of the year at a rustic cabin that he built himself in the woods near Weld, Maine.

Reviews

[Petra X · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've always liked books on animal behaviour, especially if they lean towards the scientific as much as the anecdotal and exclude all pc chat about environmentalism which might be important but makes boring reading. This book is a carefully observed account of several Canada geese and rather a lot of songbirds plus some quite interesting beavers over a period of some years.

It wasn't in the class of the despicable Konrad Lorenz's King Solomon's Ring or Here Am I--Where Are You?: The Behavior of the Greylag Goose both wonderful books I read years ago. But it did explain why Konrad Lorenz was a Nazi who was fully behind - indeed helped develop - the appalling racial policies that led to the murder of millions of Jews, half a million Serbs and up to two million Gypsies - all of whom were considered untermensch, subhuman polluters of the white Aryan nation of Germany and its allies.

It all came about because many geese can interbreed with others - Canada geese can certainly interbreed with snow geese and greylag geese. Lorenz felt that an animal's behaviour was not only a function of learning but also of its evolutionary descent and adaption to environment. He felt that man's changing of the environment and domestication of animals mean that these hybrids that would otherwise be pruned out in the wild would thrive and might gain a reproductive advantage over the wild species and would exhibit non-species specific behaviour that would degrade the wild species to an inferior, 'mongrelised' one. Therefore, adhering to Nazi principles, placing the species above the individual, he felt that purity of race would only be preserved by rigorously exterminating the 'hybrids'.

He rejected empirical evidence that his theory simply wasn't true and extrapolated it to humans: Jews, Gypsies, Serbs, homosexuals etc would degrade and make inferior the wonderful 'pure, white, Christian' Aryan nation and should therefore unsentimentally be exterminated. At one stage he was himself administering tests of 'worthiness' on people and those who failed went to concentration camps where they were subsequently murdered.

Although Lorenz later tried to worm out of much of his collaboration with the Nazis, a direct quote from him shows his culpability and despicability: "Just as with cancer-suffering [for which:] mankind cannot give any other advice than to recognise the evil as soon as possible and then eradicate it, so racial hygiene defense against elements afflicted with defects is likewise restricted to employ the same primitive measures."

For elucidating the connection between Lorenz's scientific studies on the greylag goose and his promulgation of the Holocaust on racial grounds, I upgraded this book from a 3.5 star to a 5 star. Its a very readable, well-written book, very gentle, nicely illustrated and apart from a page or two, totally non-political. A good read.

[Diane S ☔ · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 I first heard about this author from a few of my Goodread friends, they praised his writing and his treatment of subject matter. It was not this book in particular, this book I found for myself being long fascinated by the many geese that fly over my house in the Fall.

Whoever, thought I would find geese so fascinating? There is suspense, love, fighting, cheating on spouses or maybe better put, the replacement of spouses, heartbreak and the raising of families.. There is so much going on at this bog, with the geese but other birds and animals as well.

The author and his son raised a young goose called Pip. so much of this story concerns PIp's life with them and after she left them. This author made me feel like I was with him, watching at the Bog, tracking a noting every little thing that went on. I found it admirable the amount of time he spent there but then again he is a naturalist and this is what he finds intriguing. While I loved reading about all these things, this is not something I could do. I am glad, however, that there are people who can and then also have the ability to write about their experiences.

[Terence · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Geese of Beaver Bog is a wonderful book. It's a several-years-in-the-lives account of the title's geese as well as the bog's other inhabitants. The author, Bernd Heinrich, is a professor of biology but this isn't a formal study of goose social lives. It's just a chronicle of the observations he made of the animals living in the ponds around his Vermont home. The main part is science light, though Heinrich appends a few, brief essays and a bibliography that discuss theory and direct readers to more "scientific" literature.

And the bog contains quite a collection of individuals. The "Summer of Love" never ended here as Heinrich witnesses mate-swapping and sybaritic promiscuity that would have Focus on the Family howling with dismay. But he also witnesses the adoption of stray goslings and the care parents take to make sure their children survive.

Heinrich establishes quite close friendships with four geese in particular: Peep, Pop, Jane and Harry (the wife-swapping pairs mentioned above), and he observes behaviors that aren't in the "geese textbooks" but reveal these birds as intelligent, feeling creatures who are not wholly governed by genetic programming but are independent actors.

One of the more interesting behaviors was a migration of parents and young from Heinrich's bog to a smaller pond a couple of miles away (which occurred every year that the author observed the geese). At first glance, it would appear insane to cross two miles of predator-infested woodland (including a manmade road) trailing days-old goslings. Heinrich reasons that, in part, the more open landscape of the second pond afforded a more comfortable environment for the geese, who evolved in tundra-like conditions. The manifest dangers were less of a cost than the benefit of the psychological comfort afforded by a wide open, defensible pond (a good bet on the geese's part since in both migrations observed, the entire families made it intact).

It's a human tendency to overgeneralize so that we speak of "the black community" or "evangelicals" or "the American people" as if these were real groups, all of one mind and body. Yet, when one flies closer to the ground, all the peaks and valleys, forests, and rivers come into sharp focus. That's one of the most attractive features of this book. By flying so close to the ground, Heinrich and his readers come to see the geese for the individuals they are.

I was planning on giving this book three stars - I "liked it" - but the last few pages actually made me sit up (literally, since I began looking for a piece of paper and a pencil to write down my epiphany). A light went off in my head as Heinrich inadvertently managed to articulate a philosophy of moral ecology that I had been seeking for years in order to justify how I felt about the world around me and how we should treat it. Essentially it comes down to two principles:

1. Every creature has the right to life but that right is circumscribed by the ecosystem's right to survive.

2. No species has the right to so overwhelm its ecosystem as to cause the extinction of another, and that includes humans and their, so far, unchecked intrusions into every biota on the planet.

Now, it would be morally unjustifiable and repugnant to implement any form of coerced population control (viz., China's one-child policy) but it is equally repugnant not to consider the optimum carrying capacity of an ecosystem and living in such as way as to maintain it (the Modern idea of unlimited economic growth is called "cancer" in medical circles and, there, is considered a bad thing). (I've read somewhere that the "optimum carrying capacity" of the U.S. is around 30 million to 40 million humans, a tenth of our current population.)

Even if you don't agree with Heinrich's philosophy, it's undeniable that animals are highly complex creatures with lives nearly as involved as humans' (certainly among the mammals, fish and reptiles), and have roles in a healthy environment crucial to everyone's survival.

It would behoove the reader to keep that in mind when considering the quality of our future here on Earth.

[Ray · Rating 5 out of 5]

Paperback |

I adore Bernd Heinrich. If you like nature, even remotely, you will love this author too.

[Ladiibbug · Rating 5 out of 5]

Non-Fiction

Author Bernd Heinrich, who studied at the University of Maine and UCLA and is Professor Emeriti of Biology at the University of Vermont, is a superb science writer.

His soul-deep enthusiasm for the minutia of details about birds, the forest, whatever he writes about, is deeply satisfying to readers who are also fascinated by the animals and flora of the natural world.

This book chronicles the author's relationship with a gosling named Peep, and follows her as she finds a mate, migrates, returns to her original nest in a pond. There is an uneasy peace with other pairs of geese who nest in the various other locations in the pond.

Like his excellent Mind of the Raven: Investigations and Adventures with Wolf-Birds, the author will climb trees to get a better observation point, build custom-made nests to test his theories, and rise in the pre-dawn hours to hurry down to the beaver bog (pond) to begin watching the geese as they awake.

Being a bird lover myself, his introduction perfectly encapsulates my feelings about running outside at the geeses' honking sounds to watch the annual migration of Canadian geese:

There is something in the ceaseless chatter of migrating geese that stirs me. Perhaps it touches something wild, remote, and mysterious that I share with them, for it is almost with longing that I look up every fall and spring when the scraggly V formations wing their way overhead high in the sky. Perhaps it is the tenor of their haunting cries, their mastery of sky and distance, their commitment and single-mindedness in striving to reach far-off goals that enchant.

[Kerri Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's a fine line between observation and interference, between reverence and recklessness. Heinrich tries to walk that line through and around his "beaver bog" but he isn't always so successful. More than a few parts of his narrative made me cringe for the likely irrevocable damage he did to some of these geese, and to their nesting capabilities. There was far too much anthropomorphizing in this story for my liking, far too much feeding the geese, and far too much of Heinrich attempting to domesticate and tame what otherwise would (and should) have been wild Canada geese.

[Still, I liked Peep, and learning about less-familiar-to-me ecosystems and the interesting creatures inhabiting them, so three stars for that.]

[Mackenzie Brooks · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really love geese. No seriously. The author is my spirit animal.

[Allen Steele · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was pretty wonderful. Learned the habits of the Canadian Geese, nesting habits, and rearing young. Good, not great, but good.

[rainydaybakery · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book to better understand one of the most common large wild birds in my daily lives. While some city dwellers find them annoying, I've always found Canada geese beautiful, elegant, and fascinating. It's hard to separate how much of my positive expression comes from my love of birds and nature, and how much from the power of the narrative. Either way, Heinrich's storytelling is clear, and his occasional digressions into analyses and descriptions of other birds, mammals, and insects around the bog are both interesting and educational.

The book centers on a female goose named Peep, using her story as a thread to weave together behavioral observations and vivid details. It covers not just the Canada geese themselves but also their nesting environment in the beaver bog, which makes for engaging reading. The book helped explain many goose behaviors I've witnessed, such as the "crèches" - where one pair of foster adult geeses watches over goslings from multiple families. There are rich observations about nesting and details about intraspecific conflicts.

These are all typical merits of a nature writing book. However, there are some shortcomings when the author attempts to elevate the themes. I agree with other reviewers that the motivations and themes become somewhat confused. In some plot, the author certainly crosses some boundaries in his interactions with wild animals. He also includes an appendix discussing Goose population and defending hunting, which feels awkward and unnecessary for me, especially as his analysis of Canada goose populations focuses on their urban population explosion without addressing how some local residents (like in the Midwest) became vanished by overhunting in the early 20th century. To be clear, I'm not opposing the author's particular arguments, but rather noting that some complex topics, while raised, aren't comprehensively addressed and don't align with the book's main tone.

Nevertheless, for readers who are geese fans and interested in their behavior, this book can be a valuable and engaging read - as long as they maintain critical thinking about boundaries in wildlife interaction, and have their own independent views on some conservation issues.

[Colleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

A surprisingly enjoyable read about the lives and drama of various geese who mate, nest and hatch their young near the author's home. It would actually be a solid 5 stars but for two points:

1. Some of the descriptions of other bird life in the bog were excruciatingly detailed - birdwatchers might enjoy them, but for me they ultimately dragged a bit. The hours and hours spent quietly observing bird life while the author's family was presumably at home without him - that really came through the pages like an exhausting gush of marshy, tweet-filled air.

2. My biggest qualm with the book, though, was his interference in the lives in the geese - repeatedly visiting nests and taking out / replacing eggs despite the geese's at times obvious discomfort with his behavior. At first I chalked it up to him being a biologist, but there was a point where I almost didn't finish because it seemed excessive.

Ultimately I'm glad I persisted, because he eased up and the story of the geese was truly captivating. His love of one goose in particular, Peep (oh Peep!) was infectious and I kept reading on, as he surely kept observing, in the hopes of one day seeing Peep again.

[Megan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is really enjoyable, for a certain subset of readers. I have spent time observing geese (and grew up with them) so for me, this was a charming read that fed my curiosity to understand them. The author observes wild geese with warmth and humor and uses his background in biology to explain why they do the things that they do. At times he goes on a bit longer about something than he needs to, but generally I feel I learned a lot from this book. The past two weekends I have had fun walking down to watch the newly hatched goslings in my area, and have felt satisfaction that I "knew" them better than I did before. It will scratch the itch for readers looking for nature writing like Thoreau's Walden.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very enjoyable story of the comings and going of geese in the author's area over the course of several years. I loved Peep and how she was in and out of the narrative the whole time. It was also nice to learn more about Canada geese, their behaviors and other details. The author also introduces other birds, mammals, etc., and nature as they appear in the bog, which was interesting too but at times took away from the geese (and I was only concerned with the geese!).

[Lilia Anderson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am not an avid nonfiction reader and have certainly never read a book like this, but I’m so glad I did. I’m fascinated by the geese around my apartment and I enjoyed reading this book. It definitely taught me a lot and kept it accessible for a non-sciencey person.

[Jay Warner · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book for its blend of story-telling and science. The author spent a lot of time documenting the birds and other wildlife in a beaver bog near his home. He is particularly drawn to the geese that nest there each year and even gives them names, but he keeps a keen observer's eye and does not anthropomorphize them to any great degree. I was grateful that "nature red in tooth and claw" was kept to a bare minimum. I enjoy reading about the lives of animals but do not enjoy reading of their deaths. Thankfully it was not an issue with this book. If you have an interest in Canada geese or in pond life in general, you will enjoy this easy-going book. The author pulls you along on an adventure and a lesson you hardly know you are learning. The after-notes are also interesting and shed some insight the reader might appreciate.

[Nikki · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was looking forward to The Geese of Beaver Bog as I have seen the book noted in other nonfiction numerous times. However, the book itself was dull, frustrating and read like an observation log for too much of its length.

Unfortunately I found Heinrich's writing weak, it is too often dry and feels as though it lacks emotion much of the time. This, of course, goes hand in hand with the observation log style I noted, but it does nothing to bring forth a reader's interest. It was not textbook level dry, but his style would not cause me to become a fan of the nature/environmental nonfiction genre if I were not already one. The only time Heinrich seemed to come alive at all were the times he leapt from bed (I think I read that one too many times) and when he spoke of Peep. He clearly enjoyed Peep and had he brought this attitude of enjoyment to his overall study it would have been better.

I probably would have been able to tolerate the dry reading much more had Heinrich not annoyed me so much with his approach and had I learned much of anything about geese. Unfortunately I went into this knowing nearly as much about geese as I finished, and that to me is a downfall for any nonfiction book to have. It did not help that Heinrich's methods involved him "taming" the geese to allow his presence and interference, which does not exactly allow for impartial, necessarily natural actions to be witnessed and recorded. Heinrich spends much too much time riding in a kayak and annoying at least one particular goose, handling eggs of a wild geese pair and constantly interfering in one way or another, even if it were feeding or calling the individual geese. The scientific part of me is irritated by the fact that Heinrich's methods do not allow for much to be learned of geese and the environmentalist/vegan in me is irritated that Heinrich did not leave the geese alone. Either befriend the geese and leave their eggs alone and don't harass them with a kayak, or be an observer that stays out of the situation. Overall I would say Heinrich's motivations are confused.

[Diane · Rating 4 out of 5]

I credit Bernd Heinrick for making me a bird lover. Heinrich's The Mind of The Raven forever made me love ravens, and all corvids for that matter. Now, this book has done the same for geese. Heinrich's loving but scientific descriptions of the geese on the beaver bog next to his home in Maine caused me to take a more detailed look at the geese as I walked along the Snake River in Idaho. I no longer saw just another flock of geese, but started to notice them as individuals. I've noticed their facial markings, the bands around their necks, their long stretched out necks, and the way they eye me as I walk by. In the spring, I'm anxious to see the behavior of the gooslings and their parents. I've seen this before, but after reading The Geese of Beaver Bog, I'll look for child rearing behaviors described in Heinrich's book. The Geese of Beaver Bog is a description of a small bog in Maine, and although Heinrich' s descriptions concentrate on the geese and their gooseling rearing practices (precipitated by his inadvertently saving and adopting a gooseling named Peep), he also writes wonderful naturalist descriptions of the wildlife found on the bog. His knowledgeable descriptions of the foxes, beavers, muskrats, birds, frogs, sedge and other plants were interesting and showed his love for the natural world. (I particularly loved his description of the flight of the male snipe and the mating calls of the frogs!) The book is greatly enhanced by Heinrich's art. Each chapter begins with his drawing of tall sedge stems. He includes, among other things, drawings of the geese and their young, and my personal favorite, the feather left by Peep.

[Michelle Brewer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book with great appendices for more information and chronology, map and illustrations. This is a well told nonfiction story with detail, wit and emotion about several geese observed by the author, a biologist. He interacted with the geese he studied and the outcomes are mesmerizing. The story is not told from as a scientific treatise, or encyclopedia, but from a nonfiction perspective and relates the real geese vying, mating, breeding, competing, and raising their young. The story includes one goose raised by the author, Peep, and her first mate Pop, to the female who stole Pop away-- Jane to the new pairings, as well as other geese visiting or making a nest on the pond. The story covers a few years and is astounding regarding Peep. From the story you learn about the egg laying, incubation, hatching and much more. It is told with a reverance for the geese as individual souls, with basic emotions, and evolutionary behaviors that are totally fascinating. Along the way the story also includes nice sojourns with red wing blackbids and so many other plants and animals of the bog. If you are a nature lover, you will love this book.

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the second of Heinrich's books that I have read. After having read "The Mind of a Raven", I was curious to see how Professor Heinrich would treat my buddies. I've become quite fond of Canada geese, and have accumulated a substantial collection of photographs of them.

The author is a proponent of "Etology" which, if I understand it correctly, seeks to study animal behavior in terms of human behavior traits. Whatever you feel about that approach, it is nevertheless interesting to me; I've been speaking to animals for years. Certainly, we speak to our pets. It is fair to assume that by a variety of clues, they understand us when we do.

Unfortunately, the author discusses only the geese that live in his area, while noting that there are a good number of different "races" of Canada geese. So I was not able to learn too much about the geese that frequent my back door every spring.

Still, it was an interesting book, and I would recommend it to anyone interested in animal behavior.

[Bluff Lake · Rating 3 out of 5]

Over several seasons, biologist Bernd Heinrich, a gifted writer and illustrator, comes to spend time with several nesting Canada geese--a species often thought of as a pest. Heinrich not only shows the complicated pairings of the geese, but also pays close attention to their individual characteristics as well--those white chin straps are unique.
Heinrich comes across as a man obsessed. He is, but the naturalist and biologist within him work together to produce an unusually enjoyable perspective.

[Ann-Marie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Go outside and look at a bird. No? I don't blame you - birds are boring and don't do much. Or so I thought! Put a pen to paper, and they're exploits are funny and full of drama. If this book had been exclusively about the geese, it would have been five stars, without a doubt. The author's observations of other bog goings-on were respectable, but dull - though not so dull that I can't heartily recommend the book.

[Cynthia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Chronicles of the wildlife, specifically Canadian geese and other birds, living and breeding in a bog in the author's backyard. He alternated between science and speculation about why the geese did the things they did. He also annoyed me with his picking a nesting goose up or prodding another with a stick so he could see how many eggs they each had. But all in all, the story was interesting and enjoyable.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book which I read for my Bird Club Book Club. Naturalist Bernd Heinrich studies the geese at the bog near his house and wonders about various goose behaviors and breeding practice. He names some of the geese and worries about their welfare. I especially enjoyed the chapter on parenting. This account is free from comments about goose elimination practices, and that was refreshing. I'd like to see him do a study of the muskrats or beaver at his bog.

[Jeremy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Geese are hugely compelling. They engage in all manner of activity, including, but by no means limited to: honking, bathing, and infanticide. I read this aloud to my wife before going to bed. It improved our already flawless relationship.

[Shirley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I LOVE this book. Bernd Heinrich is the biology professor I should have had. He brings the wonders of nature alive. I promise you will never look at Canada geese in the same way again after reading this book!

[Janet · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bernd Heinrich got up close and personal with his local Canada geese and this book reveals stuff about their behavior that was little known or unknown before. He writes so beautifully and vividly that you feel you're there with the geese too.

[Jeremy H. · Rating 4 out of 5]

A nice story about the lives of semi-wild geese. Good nature read.

[Bettie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Bernd Heinrich needs something more in his life.

[Cwoods · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book I used in my Biology class to increase comprehension and make stronger connections to ecology, homeostasis, and the environment. Read about Peep and Pop, how they live and behave as they do.

[Art · Rating 4 out of 5]

A classic diary of wildlife observation. Bernd's curiosity and patience are legendary. Recommended.

- all Heinrich are must read

[Marjie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bernd Heinrich’s nonfiction account of Peep, a canada goose, and her mate Pop reads like a novel. A bird's version of Marley and Me.