Pee Dee National Wildlife Refuge boasts many bird species journalnow.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from journalnow.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Guardians of the Geese
Gaddy’s Goose Pond drew thousands of Canada geese and people from around the world to Ansonville. by Jeremy Markovich
Hazel Gaddy and her husband, Lockhart, fed geese around their pond in 1949. After the Gaddys died, the geese stopped coming to the pond, but they still fly over it on their way to the nearby Pee Dee National Wildlife Refuge.
Geese will fly a long way for a good meal. For decades, thousands of them showed up just south of Ansonville every winter, where Lockhart Gaddy had planted wheat and corn for them. This was a change for Gaddy, who had previously hunted geese. During the first year, 1934, nine geese spent the winter on his one-acre pond. By 1952, Gaddy had made the pond 10 times larger. By then, word was out in the bird community, and 10,000 James Bay Canada geese showed up on his farm.