Yesterday I saw that there is a distinct pecking order in the land of birdwatching when it comes to geese. When I think of wild geese, it is of those Canada Geese. They are named for Canada but are all over the place and not giving Canada a very good name. Such as when they make their mess in Hyde Park in London, or just down the road from Buckingham Palace in Green Park! I mean really!
In the birdwatching hierarchy, these Canada geese seem to be far down in the rankings. This I understood as I was part of a group driving around the empty prairie fields in search of Snow Geese.
I was attending the Snow Goose Festival in the town of Tofield, about an hour east of Edmonton. The festival is held to celebrate the flocks of geese that fly over the area at this time of the year on their way to the nesting grounds in the Arctic. Not only do they fly over, but they also land to rest in bodies of water, and they feed from the fallen grain in the fields from the previous harvest.
As part of the events, we had signed up for a tour, so there we were on a school bus with two birder guides and a very patient bus driver, exploring down the far-flung township roads, between fields and isolated farms on the search for these migrating snow geese.
We spotted a flock coming in to land in a large pond off beyond a meadow to one side of the road. We stopped and all piled out of the bus. It was an amazing sight to see these hundreds of birds, all close together, land on the water. Our guides set up scopes, like a single telephotos lens, to watch them. Eventually, something spooked them, maybe us, and they all lifted together out of the pond and wheeled away. Another treat for us.
As we kept searching, we saw flocks of Canada geese, but there was no stopping the bus for them. However, we did stop for a whole collection of waterfowl including white-necked geese, ducks, coots, and dear old CGs (Canada Geese), all swimming around together in a flooded field.
But what I loved the most was seeing the Snow geese in flight, high, high up in the blue sky. Whereas Canada Geese fly in a neat V formation, taking turns to be lead; the Snow Geese, wave and weave around in a loose C formation, often two formations interweaving. Farmers and hunters used to call them Wavy Geese. Their white bodies appear and disappear in and out of the sunlight. I would lose sight of them, only to have them reappear in the sunlight, glistening, all white and silver.
The Snow geese winter in the southeastern United States, places like Louisiana. And we were told that they are doing too well as down there they get fed rice in the reserve areas to discourage them from going into the farmers’ fields to eat their rice crops. The trouble is, their population is growing too fast and they are damaging the areas they nest in the Arctic. You can hunt them. One of the few spring hunts allowed, and you are allowed to get 50 a day! However, I can report, we did not see any hunters out yesterday. I mean how many geese can you eat in a day?