Stephen Daly
Off for breakfast...
Canada Geese (Branta canadensis)
Wagbachniederung, Germany_w_0339
In 2009, US Airways Flight 1549 struck a flock of Canada geese, forcing pilot Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger to land the plane on the Hudson River, New York.
Migrating Canada geese, in their iconic v-formations, can fly an astonishing 1,500 miles in just 24 hours. They can also waddle indefinitely around your local office park.
In recent years, more people across the United States and Canada have noticed the noisy black-and-white-headed birds taking up residence year-round on golf courses, lawns, and other green spaces. Have these geese, perhaps encouraged by milder winters and easy suburban living, simply stopped flying south? In many cases, yes—but the explanation is complicated.
In the classic migration pattern, flocks that wintered in the southern U.S. fly north in the spring, returning to the same spots in the high and sub-Arctic to breed and nest. In September and October, these flocks head south again—with a new generation in tow. With an average life span of 24 years, members of this species may make two dozen migrations in a lifetime, using the same “rest stops” along the way.
But there are exceptions. Even before Europeans settled the Americas in the 1600s, some members of this species—which was later named Canada goose (not “Canadian”) by Carl Linnaeus in 1758—never migrated.
These populations nested in a swath of habitat ranging from the Great Lakes to the Rocky Mountains, moving only far enough south each winter to find food and open water. When Europeans arrived, they discovered these so-called resident geese were easy pickings, and nearly wiped them out by the early 1900s.
A half-century later, conservationists and government agencies reintroduced captive-bred birds across their former northern U.S. range, and, boosted by a few surviving flocks, resident Canada geese made an astonishing comeback.
Today the nine-pound birds live in every Canadian province and state in the continental U.S.—and their populations continue to grow. In the 1950s, about a million called North America home; that number has since ballooned to seven million, according to estimates by the Canadian Wildlife Service. (The birds are also booming in Europe and New Zealand, where they are an invasive species.)
Off for breakfast...
Canada Geese (Branta canadensis)
Wagbachniederung, Germany_w_0339
In 2009, US Airways Flight 1549 struck a flock of Canada geese, forcing pilot Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger to land the plane on the Hudson River, New York.
Migrating Canada geese, in their iconic v-formations, can fly an astonishing 1,500 miles in just 24 hours. They can also waddle indefinitely around your local office park.
In recent years, more people across the United States and Canada have noticed the noisy black-and-white-headed birds taking up residence year-round on golf courses, lawns, and other green spaces. Have these geese, perhaps encouraged by milder winters and easy suburban living, simply stopped flying south? In many cases, yes—but the explanation is complicated.
In the classic migration pattern, flocks that wintered in the southern U.S. fly north in the spring, returning to the same spots in the high and sub-Arctic to breed and nest. In September and October, these flocks head south again—with a new generation in tow. With an average life span of 24 years, members of this species may make two dozen migrations in a lifetime, using the same “rest stops” along the way.
But there are exceptions. Even before Europeans settled the Americas in the 1600s, some members of this species—which was later named Canada goose (not “Canadian”) by Carl Linnaeus in 1758—never migrated.
These populations nested in a swath of habitat ranging from the Great Lakes to the Rocky Mountains, moving only far enough south each winter to find food and open water. When Europeans arrived, they discovered these so-called resident geese were easy pickings, and nearly wiped them out by the early 1900s.
A half-century later, conservationists and government agencies reintroduced captive-bred birds across their former northern U.S. range, and, boosted by a few surviving flocks, resident Canada geese made an astonishing comeback.
Today the nine-pound birds live in every Canadian province and state in the continental U.S.—and their populations continue to grow. In the 1950s, about a million called North America home; that number has since ballooned to seven million, according to estimates by the Canadian Wildlife Service. (The birds are also booming in Europe and New Zealand, where they are an invasive species.)