Thursday, I stumbled onto a gaggle of 12 Canada geese in a local pond that was stockaded on three sides by cattails.
My sudden appearance caused the surprised geese – the jumbo jets of the goose line – to execute a mass, explosive takeoff.
Now, Canada geese (Branta canadensis) average somewhere between three and four feet in length, often have wingspans of over 7 feet, and weigh up to 8 pounds. A five-alarm takeoff of a dozen of these monsters in a confined space is a happening – two dozen big, black, fast-churning webbed feet making long, splashing strides across the water to get some uplift, accompanied by clamorous cursing in the form of booming honks.
Canada Geese are the only goose species that breeds, winters, and migrates through Maine. (Other wild geese just migrate through.) These birds were extirpated here in the last century. However, they have become increasing plentiful due to a state revival in the 1960s that “has been a bit too successful,” according to Vickery (“Birds of Maine”).
Climate warming has resulted in increasing numbers of these geese overwintering. These full-time residents produce young that become non-migratory because the immature geese have not been taught to migrate by being part of a high-altitude wedge headed south; migration is not instinctive in them.
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on March 14, 2024.)