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Re: Goose Exodus

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Joanne Howl

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Sun, 26 Feb 2012 22:40:59 -0500

 This evening I arrived at Kent Narrows at about 4:30 p.m.  Besides the Eurasian Wigeon, which was just gorgeous in the sunlight, there were three rafts of Snow Geese out in the bay, each raft conservatively holding tens of thousands of birds.  One of the birders who were out estimated the flock at 74,000 birds.  It could have been that many, or even more, I can't imagine that high, let alone count!  But there were massive amounts of Snow Geese.  

The birders said that the some recently had risen, and settled back down.  As Jon Ranson and I watched, the geese started lifting in "small" groups (hundreds of birds at a time).  I expected them to settle, but they did not.  They started heading eastward.  While traveling eastwards, they formed loose skeins and rose very high.  They then turned north-northeast and flew out of sight, quite high in the sky.  

We watched for about 45 minutes as group after group rose, turning the sky a stripey white in places, and in places the sky was simply clouded with the white birds, with black wingtips.  There were some dark birds (blue morphs) mixed in.  

They were far enough away that we could not hear what should have been a roar of noise from the show - but close enough to be really moved by the vast numbers taking off. 

As we were leaving, one birder suggested they were just staging, and had startled by a bald eagle.  To me, however, it sure looked like they were leaving.  They were far too high to be just startled, and they took off group by group, over at least 45 minutes (we left while several thousands remained). 



Joanne

Joanne Howl, DVM
West River, MD

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Peter Kaestner <>
To: MDOSPREY <>
Sent: Sun, Feb 26, 2012 10:22 pm
Subject: [MDOSPREY] Goose Exodus


Just before sunrise on Sunday, while driving east on Rt 50 just west of the 
50/301 split, I saw a huge number of Canada Geese flying north in hundreds and 
hundreds of 'Vs'.  There were birds from the northern horizon to the southern.  
As I continued east and south down Rt 50 towards Rt 404, I could still see 
thousands of geese off to the west heading north. I conservatively estimated 
100,000 geese.  In addition, at the NW corner of Rt 50 and 213, there was a 
vortex of Snow Geese that I estimated at 20,000 birds.  The Snow Geese were not 
going anywhere -- today.

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