34 degrees F Partly Cloudy Calm
Sunrise 6:14 am CDT Sunset 8:09 pm CDT
Today has been quite the eventful day on the LoonCam!
The loons have visited more often, especially this evening.
They have been up on the nest for longer periods of time and are even starting to get more serious about nest building.
They once again mated early this morning. The 6th time by my count but there may have been others I missed.
All of this is as I predicted and it is very much to be expected as we proceed toward the hopeful nesting, laying of eggs and hatching of chicks.
I would say that we are proceeding along very nicely.
But the biggest news today is not any of those things.
Very early this morning a pair of geese once again decided that this is the house and the neighborhood that they wanted to move into!
So they just moved in.
No realtor. No open house. No down payment. No contract.
One of the geese just got up on the nest while the other one swam around 'outside the house'. The goose even went so far as to start rearranging a few knick knacks int he house and even laid down and tried out one of the beds!
It took about 4 or 5 minutes for the loons all the way across the lake to see that they had intruders in their house. And they made a beeline for their nest. As the agitated loons swam around the nest, just out of view they were chasing the other goose. While the goose up on the nest peered over the edge with great concern and tried to keep track of where the loons were.
Finally one of the loons vaulted up onto the nest.
I could not tell if the loon actually stabbed the goose. But I would not be surprised it it did or at least tried.
The goose jumped backwards, hit the camera with its wings, then bounced on the nest as it took off as fast as it could fly.
It was quite amazing to watch.
Gail, one of our faithful viewers for many years fortunately was recording the whole incident and posted a video of it at Larry's Loon Lovers on Facebook as well as on YouTube. I think you would find it very interesting to watch at one of those two places.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsqcKu8luNE
I asked Gail if she would allow me to send it to our NBC affiliate tv station in the Twin Cities, KARE11 and she graciously agreed.
KARE11 used the video on at least one of their newscasts tonight, although unfortunately they did not include the sound so people did not hear the 'bang' of the goose hitting the camera.
As of right now as I write this, there have been over 11,000 views of that video!
I have even gotten word that television stations in Houston and Seattle have shown the video tonight! I am sure we will get word of even more stations in the days ahead!
Isn't this incident SO typical of what happens on the LoonCam?
99% of the time you are watching plants grow on the empty nest.
And then in an instant out of nowhere something unbelievable like this happens.
Keep watching to see what will happen next.
You don't want to miss it!
And thank you to all of you who watch so faithfully and document every thing for everyone else.
Copyright 2015 Larry R Backlund