Population explosion

Heidi (aka Red) and I visited our local county park a few weeks ago. We had not been there since November, so we were fairly certain that we would see a variety of birds we may not have seen last fall. We didn't know what to expect, except we thought there should be some birds nesting in Vasona County Park in Los Gatos. We both have Mondays off which helps when one wants to visit a popular spot. After walking about a mile on a trail that follows Vasona Lake, (this is the back way in), we finally approached the main part of the park. On this day there was a group of school kids with parents and teachers having a picnic. And there are always lots of bikers and runners along the trail and within the park. We didn't see any others with binoculars and cameras. Little do they realize how much they miss when they aren't looking around their environment. Everyone seems to be in a hurry to get from point A to point B. Oh well. Anyway, I wanted to present a few parents and their offspring in this post. It was funny to see a couple of Canada geese swimming in the lake and then proceed to go past a lot of people guiding their little blessed events to a grassy area to feed. One thing for sure. They were not afraid of humans!

Here is a gosling all by himself/herself. I'm sure mom and/or dad was nearby. Two surprises with this visit was the number of adult Canada geese waddling around with their offspring. There were so many of them, and each family had a varied number of offspring. The other surprise was the difference in the size of the chicks/goslings. Some looked like they had barely hatched, and others looked like they were 2-3 weeks old. Any idea how old this little one is?

Here is one parent with just three little hatchlings. You can click on any of the photos to see a larger image.

Here are mom and dad with their 5 little goslings swimming toward the edge of the lake to head off to feed in a grassy area.

Here is another family of 5.

And look at this prolific family! Ten little chicks!

Here is another family of ten. Notice these chicks are larger than the previous photo.

You have to enlarge this one! Count the number of chicks - how many do you see? Heidi and I think this may have been a combination of two families, but we're not certain of that. Heidi thinks there was at least one "stray" chick that joined the group, but they all look the same size to me. What do you think?