The persistence of the Hawaiian goose.
And so much like every January since what feels like the beginning of time (or at least my 9 years of involvement!) the Nene or Hawaiian geese are preparing to breed once more.
As with every Nene pair (and in some ways every monogomous couple on the planet) each pair is approaching the impending season in their own particular style...
AXU has forever been a complete sweetie. This compact 11 year old female has had more than a few husbands over the years, and is one of the last remnant 'A' rings which we will soon start to see 'die out' within the WWT collections. As a result of this she feels to me as if a matriarch of the flock, one of our true originals. Her current husband of the last 2 years is BFF, a 4 year old male who was sent down to her from the Washington centre. Possibly as a result of her age and experience this feisty young male has softened his attitude, and they are now one of the most mutually content couples that you can see in the flock today. It's just as well considering his DARVIC reads "Best Friends Forever!" This quiet duo tend to wander the grounds throughout early spring. Never rocking the boat and never causing a fuss they choose to breed in a quiet spot where they disturb no-one but themselves. Last year they found a quiet corner at the far end of the North American pen next to a clump of daffodils. As the bulbs pierced through the nest and came into flower they became one of the most ridiculously photogenic sights I've ever seen. This year they have set up camp in the Tundra exhibit. Let's hope that these two get it right in 2015.
If you are BBZ and BAX however you're going to want to claim your territory with a little more style... I have always previously described this pair as our 'hyper-productive pair' due to their clockwork reliability and excellent parenting skills. As they age however they're certainly not mellowing down; in fact they're becoming just the opposite! As BBZ has aged he has gained in confidence and these two now exert a certain level of dominance over other pairs in the flock. This mostly manifests itself as the ability to do an awful lot of shouting and showing off without any of the other pairs taking them on. To top it all off they now intimately know their way around the Grounds! This means that using their wiley Nene ways they can traverse between exhibits with ease. As traditional African pen nesters we can soon expect to see them set up camp in the viscinity of the Tropical house. Visitors should expect to see an apparently angry male Nene charging at your ankles, only to change his mind half way and stick his tongue out instead!
BFS and LTP are favourites of mine... BFS had the misfortune in early life to be rung and identified as a female. Since making this mistake we're loathe to take the DARVICs off and so this indignity is with him for life. As such he is often subject to Avicultural mistakes by those who do not know him personally. In his early life we were very confused to see him bow at the altar of the Cereopsis (a route many young male Nenes take when there are not enough unrelated females in their circle to pair up with.) For whatever reason hanging out with the Cereopsis geese appears to be a "thing" that some young male Nenes do in order to seem bigger and in their eyes; better. We removed "her" from the grounds at that point, and it was in our off-site area that BFS found his beloved partner LTP. Re-sexed a male, he was returned to the grounds with his wife and has proven himself (despite his early wild ways) to be a most devoted chap. We removed his wife for 4 days in November in order to put her DARVIC ring on (previously she was just known as "blue") and he must have run a marathon trying to find her. On her return to the Grounds I might have just dropped her off, but instead I sought him out and released her to raucous appreciation. They must have spent 20 minutes bowing and posturing. And so whenever I see these two about their Nene business I bless their cotton socks and wish them well :)
If you visit Slimbridge over the next couple of months make sure you keep an eye out for our intrepid Hawaiian geese or "Nene." If you take the time you'll soon find that they are all little individuals; and never has a Nene needed hand-feeding more than during their un-seasonal breeding season...
