Baby Geese Are Seriously Adorable

There's a family of Canada Geese living on a stream-side lawn down the street from our house. Today, Paul and I walked over to check out these birds' babies, who are somewhere around a week old now. Look at all the little fuzzy creatures!
 

This family lives behind a chain-link fence, and I'm pretty sure people toss them food, so they're by no means shy. When we didn't offer them any food, they just went about their regular foraging activities, and we got to watch them from only a few yards away. Canada Geese are everywhere, but they're still pretty impressive creatures. And it's hard to think of many things cuter than these little guys:
 

For such small birds, they've got awfully big feet:
 

And such fuzzy baby goose butts!
 

This baby looks handsome in a patch of tiny speedwell blooms:
 

The babies toddled around just fine, but every few minutes they'd get tired of walking and just plop down to forage while sitting instead:
 

Mmm, food. If you look really close you can just see the serrations inside this bird's bill, all the better for pulling up bits of greenery:
 

There actually turned out to be two family groups of Canada Geese in this spot. The second group (with its two goslings) wasn't eager to stay close when we walked by, and the parents led the babies off into the water:
 

I think it's cool that this random little part of the stream can support so much life, even nestled as it is between factories and offices. Northern Rough-winged Swallows zoomed above the water while we were there, and I was surprised to see a Common Merganser hanging around as well:
 

It's nice to get out and meet the neighbors!