The Goose that Laid the Golden Eggs
4 Comments »16th February, 2007; Category: Ducks Geese and Swans
I have been featuring various idioms, their origins and meanings on my writing blog. Some of these feature bird related topics or words. Today I highlight another of these interesting expressions.
This week’s idiom: “To kill the goose which lays the golden eggs.”
Origin:
This saying comes from the Aesop’s fable The Goose that Laid the Golden Eggs.
A man and his wife had the good fortune to possess a goose which laid a golden egg every day. Lucky though they were, they soon began to think they were not getting rich fast enough, and, imagining the bird must be made of gold inside, they decided to kill it in order to secure the whole store of precious metal at once. But when they cut it open they found it was just like any other goose. Thus, they neither got rich all at once, as they had hoped, nor enjoyed any longer the daily addition to their wealth. (From Wikipedia)
Meaning:
The commonly used meaning of this expression relates to the act either and individual or an organisation that abuses a source of income or profit through excessive greed to the point where that income is destroyed.
Example:
By not looking after the needs of his customers, the shopkeeper killed the goose that laid the golden eggs.
Photo:
The photo below shows a Cape Barren Goose, an Australian bird. It does not lay golden eggs. Some entrepreneurs tried to harvest these birds from the wild for use in their restaurants here in South Australia. They were soon stopped because the total world population is only something like eight to ten thousand. Such slaughter would inevitably have resulted in “killing the goose that laid the golden eggs.”
Cape Barren Goose
Bird restuarants in Nepal
2 Comments »15th February, 2007; Category: Birds in the News
Several species of endangered vultures in Nepal are getting some special treatment.
Restaurants For Endangered Vultures [ 2007-2-9 ] By Bhimsen Thapaliya
In an innovative measure to save the endangered vultures, Nepalese conservationists have set up clean feeding centres where the large fliers can have their favourite food that is free from killer toxins. The vulture restaurants are attracting the birds from distant places raising the hope that the uncontaminated diet would help recover the South Asian birds under critical decline.
For more about this unusual conservation measure click here.
To read about my adventures in Nepal click here.
Bird strikes on planes
Birds and planes don’t mix all that well. A bird flying into a plane can cause some very serious damage to the plane, endangering the lives of those on board. Sadly, it doesn’t do much for the bird either.
While there have been few serious bird strikes on planes in Australia in recent years, they still number in the hundreds of incidents annually. Worldwide the cost is estimated to be over $US3 billion. The article I read about this made no mention of how many birds are killed annually in this way. The toll must be enormous.
The most common bird strikes on planes at the Melbourne Airport are, in order:
- Common Starlings
- Australian Magpies
- Ravens
- Pigeons
- Straw-Necked Ibis
Alarmingly, in recent years there have been three incidents involving emus and planes. Presumably these were on the ground during landing or take-off. As yet, I’ve not heard of any flying emus.
Links:
- Flocking birds cause havoc in the air – from The Age newspaper.
- Bird strike at Adelaide Airport – an article I wrote last year on this topic.
Birds of a Feather and love birds
I’ve never been one to observe St Valentine’s Day because I believe that every day should be a special day for the one that you love. Many people do observe the day, however, and the Audubon web site has a special St Valentine’s Day feature to help birders celebrate this day in a special way.
They have three special features:
- Avian love birds – special courting behaviours in birds.
- Human love birds – interviews with couples who met through birding activities or clubs.
- Green gift ideas – some ideas for gifts that will benefit the birds.
To read more click here.
Some unusual visitors to our bird bath
I have written on a number of occasions about the birds that visit the bird bath in our garden. (Click here for one article with several photos.)
A non-bird visitor to the bird bath
While having lunch yesterday a Stumpy Tail Lizard (also called a Shingleback Lizard, one of the Blue Tongue Lizards of Australia), came wandering through the garden towards to bird bath on the ground. He paused to gobble down a few eremophila flowers before having long drink from the bird bath. He probably stayed for some five minutes, drinking deeply a number of times, before wandering off again.
Stumpy Tailed Lizard
A very cheeky visitor
Then late last night at just after 10pm I was outside seeing off a friend who had come to visit for the evening. We were standing about ten metres from the bird bath which was on the ground. As we were saying goodnight, we both stopped and turned because we had heard loud slurping noises coming from the bird bath.
As it was in the shadows I stepped inside, grabbed a touch and found that a Red Fox (an introduced species) had been visiting the bird bath for a drink. He casually wandered off in the beam of the torch light, quite unconcerned about my presence a few metres away. I’m not sure if I’m pleased that he feels quite at home in our garden. I must warn our next door neighbour to lock up her chooks and guinea fowl.
I didn’t get a photo of the fox.
Related Articles:
- Time for a bath – visitors to our bird bath, with many photos.