Scoping the Snows

Today we kidnapped Andy's cousin Allison from UVM and went down to Dead Creek to gawk at the thousands of snow geese that gather in the farm fields there in October. It was a beautiful, crystal clear day and very warm for October, and everyone and their uncle was out goose-watching. (Really. There were like 40 people, quite a turn-out for a bunch of geese.) When we arrived the snow geese were not that close to the viewing area, but they soon spooked and flew en masse to a closer vantage point.

Allison scoping out the geese

Lots of non-birders come every year just to see the geese, since they are quite a spectacle with their noisy squawking and impressive aerial fly-bys. But the fun of snow goose watching, for birders, is not actully to look at snow geese but to find the non-snow geese hidden in the thousands of snow geese. It's a little like "Where's Waldo." Basically we're looking for somewhat smaller geese, still white, but with somewhat stubbier bills that don't have any black on them. Those are the Ross's Geese, and they aren't there every year. This year there have been reports of up to 9 of them at a time in this flock of roughly 3,000 or so snow geese. So we basically tortured Allison all morning looking for one of these 9 Ross's Geese.

Mama, can you read me this book? So far they don't make a toddler board book version of the Sibley Guide to Birds.

Thankfully, it didn't take Andy too many hours to come up with a few views of some Ross's Geese. Even Allison got a look at them, though I'm sure inside she was thinking, "Sure, they're different..." Even so, it was a great morning to be outside and enjoying the sunshine in the company of 3,009 honkers.

See it? I'ts right there!