When Animals Attack

I filled out a questionnaire earlier this morning. One of the questions caused me pause and I tried to define my occupation into one word. I failed miserably. I ended up answering that particular question with "eclectic, entertaining substitute teacher, actor, writer, barn hand, and farmer."

The actual description of farmer isn't exactly what I do. My title is Farmer Kelly and I give barnyard tours to elementary school children. The Weston Red Barn Farm is one of my most favorite places in the entire world. Even when it's cold, wet and muddy or hot, dusty and sweaty, Red Barn Farm is the happiest place on earth. Way better than Disney Land. Okay, I would agree that not everyone would agree with my opinion, but since this is MY blog, I adamantly declare Red Barn Farm FABULOUS.

As a tourguide Farmer, I educate the visiting children about barnyard animals and how farmers and pioneers used the animals and land to live.

There are pigs. Pigs are important to farmers because pigs are good for bacon, sausage, pork chops and ham. Not only that, but also bubble gum, make up and paint brushes. Pigs eat everything, except for glass, metal and plastic.

There are chickens. They are good for eating; fried chicken, chicken pot pie, chicken nuggets, chicken tenders, Bar-B-Q chicken, lemon chicken, baked chicken, chicken burritos, chicken enchiladas. I could go on and on. The girl chickens (hens) lay eggs and the boy chickens (roosters) wake up the farm. They also help make more chickens, but that is a bit too much detail for elementary tours.

There are cows and bulls: a Jersey milking cow (Myrtle), a , Hereford beef steer (Bob), two baby bull Holstiens (Cutter and Cornelius). We get milk and all those wonderful dairy products from milking cows like Myrtle. We get hamburger and steak from cows like Bob and those baby bulls...well they'll end up making more Holstien cows for milk and will eventually end up as hamburger meat. Again...too much information for the children. I tell them how cows eat and inevitably one will poop and then I have to explain that what goes in also comes out.

I tell them about horses, both gigantic ones like the Belgian draft horse that is on the farm and miniature ones like the four mares and one gelding. There is also a donkey and I explain the differences between the three types of equines.

The farm also has turkeys, sheep, a goat, ducks and geese.

Several years ago, there was a mean grey goose. Being a boy, he was a gander, but mean nonetheless. He was not-so-affectionately named Gooszilla. The farmer tourguides stayed outside of the goose pen because Gooszilla liked to bite. If you have ever been bitten by a goose, you will know that it really hurts.

Alas, Gooszilla went to heaven (or more likely became some bobcat's dinner) and the goose pen was once more safe to enter.

This past fall, the farm had one brown goose, a white goose and a white gander. As there are several breeds of geese and the children don't really care what kind of goose they are looking at, I really haven't research what breed these three geese are. All I know is that they are all a different breed and one is a Peking goose. Last fall they were fairly docile and it was relatively easy to catch one, hold it out for the children to see and point out all the differences between a water bird and a land bird.

Then spring came.

The brown goose or maybe the white goose laid an egg. It's difficult to determine which goose laid it as they both sit on it. What is not difficult to determine is exactly which one is the gander. He is the biggest bird in the pen and turns out, the meanest. Seems he has become very aggressive over his girls and the egg.

I learned that about three minutes too late.

When I entered the pen, he came straight for me; hissing and honking with wings spread. I thought, "Cool. This will be easy to catch him." Wrong. He probably thought the same exact thing about me.

As I bent down to catch him, he bit me. Lucky for me, he only grasped my pants with his beak. Then he got a better grip. With each bite, he twisted and shook my leg. I tried to get him off of me, but he just wasn't letting go. That's when the beating started. He spread his wings and began whacking me. The front bones in the wings are much stronger than I ever would have guessed and he pounded me with venom. I managed to escape the onslaught, but not for long. He regrouped and attacked again. This time, he grabbed my other leg. More biting. Once he got a good solid grip, he stared beating me again. By now, I strongly voiced my concern and screamed like a little school girl. Keep in mind, I have a class of kindergarteners and three adult chaperones watching. That's right...WATCHING.

I managed to escape the clutches of the demon gander's beak only to be trapped by him. He had military manueverability skills to rival Rommel and herded me into the corner of the pen where the onslaught continued. So much for the tour and looking remotely adept in the eyes of young children. I leaped over the small fence and stayed several feet away from a craning neck.

Mustering up some pride on confidence, I continued with the tour and completed it with no further difficulties. Once I had the children off to the restroom to scrub their hands with soap, soap is your friend, soap, soap, soap, I told the story of the formidable fowl to another farmer. I then learned that the behavior I had experienced is called "flogging." Real farmers will tell you it's not the biting you have to worry about; it's the flogging.

Oh, yeah...turns out several farmers had witnessed the pummeling. Funny how nobody came to my aid. They stood there and watched, apparently "in" on the joke. Seems they had already been warned of the gander's aggressive behavior earlier in the week and didn't tell me.

So, now, I am ashamed to admit that I had my butt kicked by a bird.