If you've ever encountered geese before, you probably know that they can be rather ornery and aggressive birds, especially around their young. As with all animals, however, there are exceptions. The video below has gone viral because of one goose's surprisingly friendly demeanor during a roadside encounter.
Canadian Andre Bachman filmed this rather unbelievable interaction with the wild Canada goose. He noticed the bird following his truck on a gravel road near Shining Bank Lake in Alberta, Canada, so he decided to pull over to get a better idea of what was happening.
With his camera rolling, Bachman calmly approaches the goose and speaks to it in a gentle voice, and surprisingly, the goose doesn't show any significant signs of fear. According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, threat displays of the Canada goose include "head pumping, bill opened with tongue raised, hissing, honking, and vibrating neck feathers." Though the goose does have its bill opened and tongue raised as it approaches Bachman, it does not appear to be distressed in any other way; it seems much more like the goose is cautiously seeking out assistance of some sort. Since it seems like the goose is simply lost — not injured or seriously distressed — Bachman gets back in his truck and starts to drive slowly. The goose follows his cue and begins flying beside the truck, so Bachman leads the bird to water at Shining Bank Lake.
According to Bachman, the goose appeared to be happy upon arriving and decided to stay. It's uncertain what specifically possessed this goose to follow alongside Bachman's truck, but the unusual nature of this interaction has not gone unnoticed. Bachman's video has earned over 1.6 million views since being uploaded on Aug. 12, 2015. Geese as a species may have earned a bad reputation as angry birds, but this particular goose is proof that they're not all bad news.
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