Secret Lives of Wild Canada Geese

Have you ever noticed a family of geese waddling around your local park or pond, cute little yellow fluffballs hurrying behind? Perhaps they've taken up residence in a creek behind your house, or a field by a schoolyard. For author Barbara Klide, two wild Canada geese decided to make a nest in the courtyard of her office park, and the beginnings of "Secret Lives of Wild Canada Geese" took flight.

At first glance, "Secret Lives of Wild Canada Geese" looks like a surprisingly long book, but not to worry. The pages are filled with large, colorful photos taken by Klide as she and her fellow office co-workers and staff eagerly looked out their windows each day to see how their family of geese was doing. Klide narrates that the office park she worked at had an enclosed courtyard with plenty of trees and fresh green grass. This seemed to be sufficient for a pair of Canada geese, quickly dubbed Hawkeye and Mother Goose by the office workers, who claimed the park as their own and settled down to lay and hatch their eggs.

Klide brings the two years the geese lived in the office courtyard to brilliant life; each chapter is a little vignette anywhere from a couple of paragraphs to several pages long that meshes some scientific facts about Canada geese with lively prose about the fluffy goslings and protective parents waddling around in the place they decided to call home. One can almost hear the honks in the air and see loose feathers floating across one’s vision while reading along. This is not a dry, scientific book about geese, nor is it a picture book for children; it is more of a storybook for adults who want something lighthearted but realistic to read. I highly recommend it to anyone wanting to know more about the famed Canada goose or who simply wants a break from their own day-to-day life.

I read this sweet book as I’m watching the Canada geese in my neighborhood raising their little ones. I find myself engrossed in watching the changes each day, and easily disappeared into reading about the workers in a corporate office doing the same with their local geese.

The writing is easy to follow, and truly comes to life paired with the generous amount of beautiful photos. I enjoyed this book quite a bit!

My thanks to NetGalley and Bijou Publishing for access to a digital ARC.