Monday, April 24, 2000
Neighbors retrieve gosling
Raft, jeep deployed at golf course
By Sara J. Bennett
The Cincinnati Enquirer
BLUE ASH — A mother goose who makes her nest at the Blue Ash Golf Course has delighted parents and kids for nearly a decade. So when mom needed help Sunday, neighbors sprang into action.
Jackie Nussbaum, 12, is handed the gosling after it was freed from the drain in which it was trapped.
(Michael E. Keating photo)
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They used an inflatable raft, a Jeep — even a bit of Passover matzo — to rescue a gosling that got swept into a sewer while it swam in one of the golf course's ponds.
“Sometimes, things that are small can bring a community together,” said Sue Nussbaum of Evendale. “It's because of the mother goose that this was so important to us. She's like a family member.”
Each spring, the goose builds a nest on a platform covering an overflow well on the pond.
Neighbors noticed Sunday that this year's goslings had hatched. But a peeping sound from inside the 15-foot-deep well told them one baby was in trouble.
The Nussbaums tried notifying the golf course, but its maintenance personnel were off for Easter. Then they called the Blue Ash Fire Department, but firefighters said they had no water gear.
Finally, the family bought an inflatable raft and a long-poled fishing net at Kmart.
Mrs. Nussbaum and daughter Jackie, 12, paddled to the well opening and dropped in matzo, trying to coax the gosling into the net. But the bird ran into an underground pipe.
The gosling was spotted several feet away under a sewer grate. Using chains attached to his jeep, neighbor Bill Barkalow pried off the grate, climbed inside, and fetched the tiny bird.
The Nussbaums paddled back out on the pond to drop the gosling into the water near its parents and four siblings. The wet, greasy bird trailed just a moment or two before paddling off with its family.
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