11 July 2025
It’s that time of year again when Canada geese are on road. For about a month the adults are flightless as they molt their wing feathers and their goslings cannot fly either so the families walk everywhere, even on the road.
In Shaler Township 100 Canada geese have been paying no attention to traffic when they cross Route 8, as shown in this 8 July 2025 video from KDKA
This is a pretty harsh environment for geese so why are they here instead of somewhere else?
Flightless geese need two important things within walking distance during their month of ground operations: a safe place to sleep on water and food during the day.
As the video points out, people are feeding the geese so that need is covered. As for water notice how Pine Creek(*) is just a short step away from the parking lots. They sleep at Pine Creek, eat at the shopping centers.
This also explains why they abandon Flagstaff Hill — a favorite feeding spot — during the breeding season. There’s not water within walking distance.
Find out more about their flightless month in this article from 2023.
(*) p.s. I corrected the Pine Creek map at 5:30pm per Scott G’s comment. Google Maps plain view shows a loop in Pine Creek that was removed 25 years ago. I altered the image to match Google’s Satellite map.
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Pine creek used to make the loop shown in the map, but the loop was removed at least 25 years ago. Pine creek now cuts straight across the end of the horseshoe. If you click on the map & do the satellite view you can see the current path it takes.
At lunch, I’ve sat in the lot behind the Burger King & Shop N Save shown in the map & watched all the birds hanging out in the creek. All the usual suspects you would expect to see, they are good entertainment!
Oh my gosh! I didn’t know the creek was re-routed. I altered the map to match the satellite view. Thank you, Scott.
It was about 35 years ago on Kensington Golf Course in Boardman, Ohio that we witnessed 50-75 redheaded woodpeckers high in the canopy. Little did we realize this how rare this moment really was.