PM Was Not Feeding Raw Meat To Geese

Despite reports to the contrary, Prime Minister Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson did not recently feed hamburger to geese. However, feeding them bread is not much better.

Vísir reports that the Prime Minister took a break from work yesterday to step outside his office and feed the geese wandering around outside.

Forsætisráðherra hugar að miðborgarkjósendum

Posted by Hannes Sverrisson on Tuesday, February 23, 2016

Many passers-by were reportedly under the impression the Prime Minister was feeding raw hamburger to the ducks. A cursory glance at the above photo does give the impression he has some hamburger patties in hand, that he is breaking off pieces of and then tossing to the geese.

Further investigations revealed this was not the case. The pinkish-red circles are actually the pattern printed on the paper napkins at the Prime Minister’s office; not hamburger patties. Geese are also not known for eating raw meat.

The Prime Minister’s assistant Jóhannesa Þór Skúlason told reporters the Prime Minister was only feeding bread to the geese. It should be noted, though, that it is highly inadvisable to feed geese and ducks bread, however widespread the practice is.

For one, bread provides little to no nutritional value to ducks. It also causes them to defecate a lot more, which brings with it its own crop of potential disease threats, such as aspergillosis. This disease, often fatal, can wipe out whole populations of ducks.

If you do want to feed our web-footed friends, you can safely offer them such safe and nutritional treats as grapes cut in half, cracked corn, thawed peas or – if you can find it – duck feed pellets.