In early spring a pair of geese pick each other as mates. Geese mate for life, and grieve to death at the loss of their mate. The eggs are pale green, yellowish, buff-white. The average number of eggs are 3-6. A gosling comes out of an egg after a month and can instantly walk.
Goslings can swim and dive without being taught and can fly when they are two months old.
They are devoted parents and never leave their goslings unguarded. Goslings live with their parents until about a year, when they mate. Geese are usually only aggressive to humans when they are protecting their young. There is an average winter inventory of 172,000 and an estimated average kill and crippling loss of 128,000. Together, there are approximately an average of 300,000 southward migrants.