Good morning, Lancaster County. It's the first Tuesday in August, which means police departments across the county are hauling bounce houses into parks tonight and calling it National Night Out. Before you head out, a story about a goose, a volunteer named Rita, and a length of fishing line.
In today's Lancaster Local:
A wildlife volunteer finds out what was actually wrong with a struggling young goose
Bounce houses, a mechanical bull, and Lititz police in a park tonight
A Disney and Hanna-Barbera cartoonist teaching Quarryville how to draw
Ice cream on the Ephrata Cloister grounds, and a reptile guy with 100 roommates
COMMUNITY NEWS
She could tell the goose was in trouble. She couldn't tell why until she got close.
The call came in about a juvenile Canada goose that would walk a few steps, then sit back down. Rita, the capture-and-transport volunteer for Raven Ridge Wildlife Center in Washington Boro, got out to it and watched from a distance first. That's protocol. A waterfowl acting strangely could mean avian influenza, West Nile, or lead poisoning, and you don't want to find that out with your hands already on the bird.
When she finally got close, the answer was wrapped around its legs. Fishing line, wound tight and buried deep enough that the cuts underneath had already started to turn.
Rita didn't cut it loose in the field. Raven Ridge would rather work on a calm, sedated bird than a panicking one in tall grass, so she caught the goose and drove it back to the center. Staff pulled out every strand, cleaned and disinfected the wounds, and started it on antibiotics and pain management. It's getting “tub time” now — a chance to groom itself and use both legs the way it's supposed to. Another week in that line and the circulation would have gone, and with it the legs.
They expect it to make a full recovery and go back out.
One number from their write-up that's worth carrying around: conventional fishing line takes up to 600 years to break down. The biodegradable kind takes about 18 months.
EVENTS
Three things happening tonight, then a week that runs from an ice cream social to a room full of snakes.
🚓 National Night Out — Treehouse Playground, 300 West Orange Street, Lititz, PA 17543. Tonight, Tuesday, August 4, 5:30–7:30 p.m. Free. Lititz Borough Police put this on as part of Lititz Endless Summer, with bounce houses, the Bull Guys mechanical bull, and Kiwanis on hand. It's the one night a year you get to meet the people who show up when you call 911 without needing to call them.
✏️ Cartooning for Adults and Teens — Quarryville Library, C.X. Carlson Cultural Room, 357 Buck Road, Quarryville, PA 17566. Tonight, Tuesday, August 4, 6–7 p.m. Free, ages 14 and up. Ed Klein has drawn for Walt Disney, Warner Bros., Don Bluth, and Hanna-Barbera, and he's spending an hour teaching you to caricature whatever's in front of you. Registration closes at 5:45 p.m. today, so if this appeals, sign up before lunch.
⚾ Lancaster Stormers vs. Staten Island Ferry Hawks — Penn Medicine Park, 650 North Prince Street, Lancaster, PA 17603. Tonight, Tuesday, August 4, 6:45 p.m. First of a three-game set against the Ferry Hawks. Ballpark Digest voted this the best ballpark in the country, which the Stormers will happily tell you themselves.
🔭 Astronomy Enthusiasts of Lancaster County — Lititz Public Library, Community Room, 651 Kissel Hill Road, Lititz, PA 17543. Tomorrow, Wednesday, August 5, 6:30–7:45 p.m. Free, no registration. The county's amateur astronomy club meets in public and doesn't mind beginners. Bring the question you've been embarrassed to ask.
🎭 Sister Act Sr. — On Main Event Venue, 732 West Main Street, Mount Joy, PA 17552. Friday, August 7 and Saturday, August 8, 1–3 p.m. Free. The Perennial Players are an all-resident cast out of Juniper Village at Mount Joy, and they are putting on a full musical. Two afternoons only.
🎨 Nature Journaling: Meadow Masters — Kellys Run Nature Preserve, Holtwood, PA. Saturday, August 8, 1–3 p.m. The Lancaster Conservancy sets up a picnic-table gallery of botanical art at the Kellys Run pavilion, talks through how meadows get put on paper, then turns everyone loose to try it. Check the registration page for cost.
🍦 Ephrata Cloister Ice Cream Social — Historic Ephrata Cloister, Ephrata, PA. Sunday, August 9, 1–4 p.m. $10 adults (11 and up), $5 youth (6–10), $5 for Ephrata Cloister Associates members, free for kids 5 and under. The Associates open the grounds for their annual social. No guided tours that afternoon — you wander the 18th-century buildings yourself, with guides posted in most of them.
🦎 Jesse Rothacker — Forgotten Friends Reptile Sanctuary — Manheim Township Public Library, Morgan Center, 595 Granite Run Drive, Lancaster, PA 17601. Monday, August 10, 1:30–2:30 p.m. Free, registration required. Rothacker shares his house with more than 100 cold-blooded animals and brings a batch in to introduce one at a time. Worth noting: registration opened last Wednesday for Manheim Township and East Lampeter residents, and opens tomorrow, Wednesday, August 5, for everyone else. Kids under 8 need an adult with them the whole time.
🎵 Concerts by the Creek — Grater Park, Ephrata, PA. Tuesday, August 11, 6–8 p.m. Free, all ages. Nineteenth summer of this one. The Nobles play at 6, Improvement Movement at 7, with food trucks and a local brewery in the park. Rain or shine — if the weather turns, it moves indoors to the EPAC theatre.
Weather
Tuesday, August 4 — Mostly sunny and a high near 86, with a northeast wind around 5 mph. After yesterday's rounds of showers, this is about as agreeable as early August gets here. It drops to about 66 overnight and turns mostly cloudy, so the National Night Out window should stay dry.
Thanks for reading Lancaster Local. If you found something useful, forward it to someone who still gets their news from a Facebook group.