The Canada goose looked at me with one beady eye. Each time he turned his head to size me up, it was with one beady eye. He had swum across the still pond with a determination that could mean only one thing: His mate was sitting on their nest, and he would defend her with his beak of fury.

He also had one very loud warning cry, one that dashed my hopes of seeing any other birds in this perfect spot, a clearing with a rill that bubbled over fallen, moss-covered branches.