In the middle of this picture you see Diamond on the left and Woodroffe on the right, two Sebastapol geese (the other two, Ola and Seli – named after my nieces, Olivia and Selina, are Pilgrim geese). At the time I couldn’t wait for Woody and Diamond to grow up because I’d seen pictures of how beautiful they would become as adults. See the Wikipedia link here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sebastopol_Goose
Well, now that they are nearly fully grown, they are indeed beautiful, almost magical, in appearance. Here is Woody.
And here is Diamond.
They are almost impossible to tell apart now except that Woody has a little grey mark on the right side of his forehead and is much friendlier than Diamond. As you can see, Diamond has developed a bit of the Godfrey arrogance! In fact I suspect that Diamond may well be a male, and Woodroffe might be a female, but it is obviously too late to change their names because, when I call them, they respond to these names.
I kind of miss the cute, soft cuddliness of their littleness, but they still like to have their incredible feathers stroked! The only drawback is that these curly feathers sometimes float up into my nostrils which doesn’t help the hayfever I always suffer this time of year.
When I went to the chemist the other day, he asked me what was the main trigger and I said, “Sebastopol goose feathers.”
He looked at me strangely before handing me the tablets.
jmgoyder 
I think they’re gorgeous as goslings, but sebastopol geese have nice shapes as adults too. I’m wondering if it’s possible that it was a sebastopol goose I saw on the lake in the Botanic
Gardens some weeks ago. I felt it was definitely some sort of white domestic goose – it looked so out of place amongst the darker wild ducks which was why I noticed it in the crowd.
Dare I ask exactly how many birds you’ve got now?
Sounds like a sebastopol to me.
They are beautiful Julie. The gender thing will be clear soon enough. Do you pick them up and sit them on you lap? They look cuddly. I have noticed a big difference in the bond you can form with geese depending on how old they are when you get them and it seems like even 2 or 3 weeks old and they have gone a bit wild.Adult ones seem to be set in their ways which is why I don’t have one yet – I want to get one the day it’s born so it bonds with us and doesn’t
Get all wild and hormonal. Have fun with them
They are all pick-upable and I would do so except that would invoke the wrath of Godfrey, so I simply pat them – very carefully!
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