Residents in a quaint Yorkshire village are up in arms over plans to remove a pair of geese from a local pond for “road safety” reasons. Parish councillors have moved to evict white goose Lucy Goose and her mate from Townend Pond, near Stillington High Street, two years after she took up residence at the picturesque spot. The male Chinese goose was only recently brought in to keep Lucy – who is owned by local resident Molly Dickman – company at the pond she shares with local ducks.
But local officials decided that the pair should be handed back to their owners or re-homed at a different pond “in the interests of road safety” during a Stillington Parish Council meeting on July 2. A petition to keep the geese at Towned has received over 1,163 signatures – more than the population of the 828-person Domesday village – and retired field hand Betty North, 91, said she “couldn’t believe” the council’s decision.
“These geese are more recent, but we’ve had ducks for years and years, and wild geese of course,” Betty said.
“We tried very hard to get some geese on the pond, and this is what we did. We’ve got one, and it wanted a mate, so some folks went to a lot of bother to find a mate.
“Then it’s come to all this, they want to get rid of it. I just couldn’t believe it – to think we’ve had these for years and years. I cannot believe it really.”
Gelda Churton, wife of parish councillor Robert Churton, who authored a report on the geese for the parish council meeting, said her husband would not be commenting on the situation.
“Our thoughts are absolutely our thoughts, but as he’s a parish councillor, he has to go along with what their thoughts are,” she said.”
“Quite honestly, we have been feeding those geese for the last almost two years, and we looked after Gurty, who’s now known as Lucy [when] the person who owned her acknowledged she was just left there all through the winter by herself,” Gelda added. “We’re very fond of them.”
Leighanne Smith, admin of the ‘Save the Stillington Geese!’ Facebook page, wrote: “We have learned that the parish council as decided to remove the geese without consulting the villagers.
“The white goose has lived here peacefully for at least two years, sharing the pond with both duck families and moorhens. It was a sad time when she initially lost her gander, but she is quite happily settled with a new man, the Chinese goose, and they are a bonded pair.
“They recently laid a clutch of eggs but these were unexpectedly removed. Please don’t let our geese be removed too. We respectfully ask our parish councillors to rethink their decision and enter into meaningful discussions with the villagers on the future of the Stillington geese.”
The Express has contacted Stillington Parish Council for comment.
