A rainy Sunday morning @ Lake Lanier

We have been feeding the Blue Jays at lake lanier for several years. We just toss peanuts on the cement walkway and the jays hear it and come flying in from all directions. It really is funny to see them swoop down and grab the peanut. We have had more than 20 jays in the trees around us as we toss peanuts. The sound of several jays in the trees cracking peanuts is hillarious!!

The squirrels, brown thrashers, mockingbirds, cardinals, chickadees, and titmouses also occasionally come to fight for their share of peanuts.

This is the first year the canadian geese have come to eat the peanuts also. There are alot of canadian geese around lake lanier and they usually just ignore us as we feed the jays. We have had a cold and long winter this year and I guess the geese are just hungry.

If you visit lake lanier you have probably seen the signs asking you not to feed the geese. Which, we have never done besides this time. We stopped at the visitor center today and asked the park ranger about feeding the geese. He told us it was fine to feed the geese, ducks, squirrels, and birds in the spring and summer. In the fall if the geese are fed they will sometimes not migrate as they should. He told us the no feeding rule is not really enforced. He did tell us that they wish people would stop feeding the feral cats. There is a very large population of feral cats at West Bank. We have seen several people leave bowls of food for them. The sad thing is in May when the baby duck and geese hatch they are hunted by the feral cats. We see large families of baby ducks and geese when they first hatch, then as each week passes we see Momma ducks and geese with 1 or 2 babies.

Update 3-29-2010
News story about the cats at this park:
http://www.wsbtv.com/video/22993262/index.html

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• lake
• sydney
• lanier
• buford
• georgia

[jxh0703]

Aww, looks like fun! It's like your birds, you make the different species all intermingle!

and I see our canadian geese were probably hungry flying all the way down there - Georgia? Vancouver Olympians :p

[rita191919]

@jxh0703 LOL....yes they must have had a rough migration this year. You should have fed them before they left. :-) Is that where they come from? They spend the winter in Canada? You would think they would prefer to stay here for the winter as it is warmer.

[jxh0703]

@rita191919 I had to google that! Apparently canada geese are very adaptable birds, and some have changed their migration patterns bcuz of farming changes, weather, settlement...

So maybe they do stay in Georgia! Or they're just making a pit-stop before they head to Mexico :p

[rita191919]

@jxh0703 I looked it up too and I now finally get it. I always wondered about their migration. What used to happen before habitat changes is they would spend cold months here and fly out in the spring back to Canada to nest. But, like you said they nest pretty much whereever they feel safe. I do get a kick out of hearing the geese as they migrate. We must live right on their route as I hear flocks flying over @ night time and also during the day.

[busafwine]

I wish someone who catch the feral cats and fix them and find them new homes!

[TheTerminator97]

@baiNEKO

We could kill them all?

[baiNEKO]

this is beautiful. we also get invasions of Canadian geese here in California... that's sad about the cats. i wonder what humane solution can be found for them

[ColleenM0317]

Got to admire how persistent they all are... Wildlife is such fun to watch. : )