Geese attack at Sullivans Pond puts 87-year-old in hospital

An 87-year-old Dartmouth, N.S., woman is recovering in hospital after she said she was attacked by geese at Sullivans Pond last Friday.

Willow Webb was out for her morning walk when she noticed nine geese swimming in a line near the edge of the pond. Next thing she knew, she was on the ground. 

"They were all after me, pecking me," Webb told CBC's Maritime Noon in a phone interview from the Dartmouth General Hospital on Wednesday.

Webb said she tried to kick the geese to get them to go away.

She said a woman saw what was happening and rushed over to help.

Webb said she was thankful the woman showed up when she did because, had she not been there, the geese "would have torn me all to pieces."

The Good Samaritan picked her up and Webb held on to her walker. She said the woman then ran back to find her friend. The two women got Webb into their car and drove her home, where an ambulance was waiting to take her to the hospital.

Webb had an operation and said she's blackened and bruised from the attack, has "got several things broken," has a cast on one of her arms and can't walk because of an injury to her hip.

Webb's family is looking to find the two people who helped Webb to thank them.

Webb said she thinks they may have been teenagers, about 18 or 19.

It could be another two weeks before Webb can leave the hospital.

"If I can walk again, I'll be happy," she said.

Following the attack, Webb said her opinion of geese has completely changed.

"I wouldn't go that way again without something to hit them with, hard," she said.