The Canada Goose
L: 16 - 25" -- W: 50 - 68"
Large gray-brown goose with black head and neck ("stocking") with a white patch ("chin strap") running onto each side of the head. Breast is light colored, white is all around the base of the tail. Bill and legs black. Sexes are alike. They mate for life -- if one is killed, the other joins a bachelor flock. Pairs often adopt other baby geese to raise.
Voice: a loud, resonant "ka-ronk", which can be heard as far as a mile.
Food: grains, grass sprouts, marine vegetation.
"Wild Geese" to most of us are the Canadas which are boldly patterned with
a gray-brown body, black head and neck, and a white chin strap which extends
up the side of the cheek. There are ten races, and the Utah race is among
the large ones. Wing spread is up to six feet. When a flock is in flight
it usually is in a V-formation so each bird has a good view forward, or in a
long undulating line. Wise old ganders are usually in the lead, and in
migration take their flocks over the Pacific, Central Mississippi, and
Atlantic flyways.
Rachel Field, a well-known author wrote:"Something told the wild geese
It was time to go;
Though the fields lay golden
Something whispered, -- "snow".Leaves were green and stirring,
Berries, luster-glossed,
But beneath warm feathers
Something cautioned, -- "frost".All the sagging orchards
Steamed with amber spice,
But each wild breast stiffened
At remembered ice.Something told the wild geese
It was time to fly --
Summer sun was on their wings,
Winter in their cry.
Canada geese which are raised on our Utah marshes, after migrating south in
the winter, return to their birth place. They mate for life. Nests are made
on the ground near water, using twigs, grasses, reeds and leaves, and are
lined with down. Five to nine eggs are laid, and these hatch in a month.
The goslings take to the water within 48 hours, following the gander, with
the female at the end of the procession. The parent birds try to keep the
goslings between them and under surveillance at all times. Often a pair will
take over the care of goslings not hatched by them. The young cannot fly
until the primary feathers are grown, and since the adults molt after
nesting, the whole family is flightless for about a month.
An interesting account of Canada geese behavior is given in a National
Geographic magazine: "Adult birds show a remarkable concern for the young,
even for those of other parents. One gosling left its family to follow the
rubber raft of naturalists John and Frank Craighead down the fast moving
Snake River of Wyoming. The little bird bobbed along for several miles until
a pair of nesting Canadas spotted it. The gander raced across the current,
feigning a broken wing to draw us off. The female called urgently, the
gosling responded, and as we drifted past the goose slipped between the raft
and the orphan to head the young gosling ashore. It was a clear-cut case of
kidnapping for protective custody."
-- by Marie L. Atkinson
REFERENCES:
The Canada Goose
Roger Tory Peterson
National Geographic -- Swans and Geese
S. Dillon Ripley