This past weekend at lakeside in Rindge (NH), we spotted a family of Canada geese almost every day passing by our lakeside cottage at the Inn. I managed to get a picture only once from far away until our very last hours on our last day. Very early in the morning I discovered them on shore right next to our front steps. By the time I got my camera, they had retreated to the water’s edge as you see them here.

The story also has an ominous theme to it: the first few times we saw them this weekend, there were six chicks. This morning we saw only these four and the male geese had a limp (the adult goose in the photo is the mommy). Our friend Pete had talked to a man fishing by the bridge earlier in the weekend who says he saw a large snapping turtle near where he was fishing. We are hoping the missing chicks and the limping male goose are not also part of the snapping turtle story. The bridge would be near the possible site of the geese’s nesting area.

The existence of large snapping turtles in the lake is not something new to us: about 50 years ago, my older brother Tommy has a story about capsizing in our family canoe on Lake Contoocook and meeting a large snapping turtle (as I recall the story).