The following is my Letter to the Editor, printed recently in a Seattle area paper…

Dear Editor,

Whenever I read an article like “Canadian geese euthanized at Lake Sammamish State Park” (Aug.7, 2013) I’m appalled by how indifferently someone can report on the extermination of entire families of intelligent, social animals. If people knew geese as personally as I do, they would surely think the species every bit as worthy of respect as our own.

I’ve watched them go through their courtship and nest-building routines, seen a gander loyally guarding his mate while she dutifully incubated her eggs, day and night, throughout windstorms and heavy snowfalls during the fickle Montana spring and witnessed with delight the hatching and rearing of their precious chicks.

The goose situation is all the more maddening since, as with so many other so-called wildlife “problems,” it was brought on by humans themselves. The old growth forests…