Canada Goose

[Dreamwoven]

Sweden has its own populations of Canada Geese. But I didn't know that they are a recent introduction to Sweden, as recently as 1929:

Canada geese have also been introduced in Europe, and have established populations in Great Britain, Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Germany, Scandinavia, and Finland. Most European populations are not migratory, but those in more northerly parts of Sweden and Finland migrate to the North Sea and Baltic coasts.[21] Semitame feral birds are common in parks, and have become a pest in some areas. In the early 17th century, explorer Samuel de Champlain sent several pairs of geese to France as a present for King Louis XIII. The geese were first introduced in Britain in the late 17th century as an addition to King James II's waterfowl collection in St. James's Park. They were introduced in Germany and Scandinavia during the 20th century, starting in Sweden in 1929.

But they are migrant, so where do they go in Winter? The same post in Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_goose also explains that they migrate to the Baltic and North Sea coasts, where they overwinter, then returning they way they came in the Spring. I does not specify where in Sweden and Finland they go in the summer.

I occasionally see Canada Geese flying west in the autumn, flying in V-formations. There is even a picture on the Wikipedia website of geese walking in the V-formation. It is a remarkable sight watching geese migrate, and hearing their cries.

[Pompey Bum]

Canada geese can be found in great numbers here in New England. There is a town in Massachusetts called Seekonk, which was the Wampanog (Indian) name for the bird. The word imitates the braying two-syllable honking the birds make as they fly. It is a beloved sound that the end of winter. I remember when I was growing up that if you heard it even from a distance and you know the hard weather was broken (and you smiled). But usually you see the geese flying really low in small V-formations flapping big wings to sustain a slow fight with this strange, awkward sort of majesty; and honking all the while: seekonk seekonk seekonk. The sound has a bittersweet quality, too, because it also sounds when summer ends and the geese (and life) move on.

The geese are not protected, because they are so numerous. Unfortunately some towns try to pass ordinances allowing them to be shot en mass. This is not for hunting but because the geese love to congregate on the open ground of golf courses. They leave scat (feces) that causes golf balls to go astray. Even when ordinances aren't passed, golfers sometimes take matters into their own hands. Such a beautiful and ancient animal killed for a thing like golf! It's really sad.

Edit: I don't know why that smiley turned up at the top of my post. Maybe the geese liked what I said. :)

[Dreamwoven]

I still wonder how they were introduced to Sweden, especially as it happened so recently. I will investigate and see if there is a simple answer.

[Dreamwoven]

Well, Pompey, you, too, are entranced by these birds.

[Dreamwoven]

I found it, in a doctoral dissertation from Umeå University: http://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:799199/FULLTEXT01.pdf, title: "Nesting and Migration in the Introduced Canada Goose in Sweden" by Göran Sjöberg (1993).

[Danik 2016]

I found a cute example of what the scientists call "imprinting":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRA3LnBwzvo

[Dreamwoven]

Funnily enough I was going to mention the faithfulness of Canada Goose to a lifelong partnership with its mate, but the video shows it working with a human "parent" as well.

[Dreamwoven]

Yesterday in the SVT programme "Mitt i Naturen" I watched an item on cranes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crane_(bird)). They are returning to Sweden after being very scarce for some years. Someone was tagging young cranes before they can fly. They are quite large, and do a courtship dance (http://www.discovery.com/tv-shows/winged-planet/videos/japanese-crane-courtship-dance/) when seeking a mate. He was particularly interested in where they migrate to in winter (probably Spain). But cranes are found everywhere (except South America, oddly enough).

[Danik 2016]

That´s beautiful, DW!
I never knew what these birds looked like.

I found a translation of the famous German Schiller balade "The Cranes of Ibycus":

http://germanstories.vcu.edu/schiller/ibykus_e.html

[Dreamwoven]

http://earthsky.org/earth/which-bird-migrates-the-farthest

Some interesting points on bird migration:

An Arctic tern can live for 25 years, so in its life-long quest for summer it can fly a million kilometers – nearly three times the distance from the Earth to the moon.

Or the albatross:
Other birds stay in one hemisphere, but go farther. For example, the Wandering Albatross spends most of its life aloft, circling the world over the oceans of the southern hemisphere. It stops only to breed on storm-swept islands near Antarctica.

Thats really cool. The albatross doesn't even need to work, just hang in the air and let the wind blow to move it.

[Dreamwoven]

I didn't know birdwatching (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birdwatching) is also called birding, to cover the fact that you don't just watch but also listen. Listening is a crucial part of watching for birds. I usually hear a skien of Canada Geese before seeing it. Same for the less gregarious woodpeckers and cuckoos. This is what the birdwatching site in Wikipedia writes about birding:

"The first recorded use of the term birdwatcher was in 1891; bird was introduced as a verb in 1918.[3] The term birding was also used for the practice of fowling or hunting with firearms as in Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor (1602): "She laments sir... her husband goes this morning a-birding."[4] The terms birding and birdwatching are today used by some interchangeably, although some participants prefer birding, partly because it includes the auditory aspects of enjoying birds."

We hang a ball of bird food on a nearby tree that our house overlooks, it attracts lots of birds, including the beautiful Great Spotted Woodpecker (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_spotted_woodpecker).

There is a website birding.com, not yet operative but worth keeping an eye on.

Like so much else in nature I bought a Collins Guide to British Birds, when I lived in Aberdeen in the late 60s.

[Dreamwoven]

Last night I watched a Swedish TV programme on the Outer Hebrides, Scotland. It was about how small-scale crofting communities contribute to the diversity of the Westernmost group of islands. How the basking sharks (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basking_shark) population has grown from almost zero to over a hundred. The same for sea eagles (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_eagle) reintroduced from Norway to the Hebrides. Puffins (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puffin) also thrive here. I used to look for puffins in the 1960s on the Western Isles, but never succeeded, so never seen one in real life. The programme was in four one-hour parts, its well worth it if you get the chance to see.

[Danik 2016]

I never heard about puffins, so I looked them up to see what they were like. Interesting video also from an educational point of view.

http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/puffin_atlantic_iceland

[Dreamwoven]

That's a nice video, showing how to "launch" puffins.

[Dreamwoven]

Puffins have character, how they show off their beaks when courting. That yellow round patch in the corner of their beak. I've always been fascinated by them. This website (http://natureofthewild.com/articles/AtlanticPuffins.htm) has extra information on this curious, sometimes comic, unusual bird:

I would frequently see puffins fly in from the ocean and land among the rocks. While watching the birds walking around they seemed to just disappear from view. They were actually entering these burrows among the jumble of rocks. The entrances were often so well hidden that I couldn't tell if a bird was passing behind a bolder or slipping into a burrow.

When I visited the island the puffins were just starting to lay eggs. Puffins lay just a single egg. Each parent takes its turn incubating the egg. After about six weeks the eggs hatch. The puffin chick is called a "puffling". The puffling remains in the burrow and actually sees very little of it's parents. The parents are frequently out at sea collects small fish for the puffling. Puffins have special serrations in their mouths that allow them to hold several fish crosswise in their beaks. Frequently they can be seen landing outside the burrow and dropping a stack of fish at the mouth of the burrow for the puffling to eat.

The adults continue to feed the puffling this way for about six weeks. At that point the puffling is about full grown and ready to fledge, or leave the nest burrow. One of the puffins primary predators at this point is the black legged gull, which can grab a puffin in flight. Since the gulls frequently have nests on the same islands and need to feed their young as well, this can be a very dangerous time for the pufflings. In order to minimize the danger the pufflings usually fledge at night, when they gulls are not active.

[Danik 2016]

More images of these amazing birds. One curious feature is their feet:
http://www.wildnatureimages.com/Wildlife/Puffin/Puffin-Photos.htm

[Dreamwoven]

you mean their webbed feet? Why is it curious? Can you elaborate?

[Danik 2016]

Exactly, DW. I didn´t realise they were swimming birds like the ducks, the swans and to some extent the geese.

[Dreamwoven]

The Swedish nature programme Mitt i Naturen had an item about the almost extinct Mountain Duck. It is being reintroduced to its original North Norrland habitat. Some 50 pairs have been flows there by helicopter and are being released there. Here are some google images (https://www.google.co.uk/search?site=&tbm=isch&source=hp&biw=1280&bih=640&q=mountain+duck&oq=mountain+duck&gs_l=img.1.0.0l5j0i5i30k1l4j0i8i30k1.3391.7322.0.1 3222.13.11.0.2.2.0.79.814.11.11.0....0...1ac.1.64. img..0.13.818.EKdTd1sh4fc) of this rare bird.

[Dreamwoven]

EarthSky (http://earthsky.org/earth/decoding-climate-change-signals-arctic-treeline-tundra-alaska) have just published an item about the changes being observed in this type of land (it's Alaska, but the Norrland mountains look just like this, too).

[Dreamwoven]

Last night I watched a Swedish TV programme on the Outer Hebrides, Scotland. It was about how small-scale crofting communities contribute to the diversity of the Westernmost group of islands. How the basking sharks (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basking_shark) population has grown from almost zero to over a hundred. The same for sea eagles (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_eagle) reintroduced from Norway to the Hebrides. Puffins (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puffin) also thrive here. I used to look for puffins in the 1960s on the Western Isles, but never succeeded, so never seen one in real life. The programme was in four one-hour parts, its well worth it if you get the chance to see.

The Outer Hebrides 4-part TV Programme also looked at the impact of crofting on nature. what is "crofting"? This website from the Scottish Crofting Federation explains: http://www.crofting.org/faqs/67.

Small-scale crofting is usually considered as being environmentally friendly. This makes it an extra asset to the Hebrides. Crofters leave parts of their lot fallow, which becomes a haven for many wild flowers. Crofters also use the seaweed abundant in the Hebrides as a natural fertiliser., spreading it on their land.

What is a croft?
A croft is a small agricultural unit, most of which are situated in the crofting counties in the north of Scotland being the former counties of Argyll, Caithness, Inverness, Ross & Cromarty, Sutherland, Orkney and Shetland, and held subject to the provisions of the Crofting Acts.
Many crofts are on estates. A landlord may have many crofts on his estate. The rent paid by the tenant crofter, except in fairly rare circumstances, is only for the bare land of the croft, for the house and agricultural buildings, roads and fences are provided by the crofter himself. Since 1976 it has become more common for a crofter to acquire title to his croft, thus becoming an owner-occupier. Should he fail to reside on or near the croft, he can himself be required to take a tenant.


The Hebrides programme interviewed a beekeeper who keeps bees for their honey, and also to help replenish their honey bee stocks, which have declined as a result of large-scale farming methods. See, for example http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2013/13/130510-honeybee-bee-science-european-union-pesticides-colony-collapse-epa-science/

See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crofting.

[Danik 2016]

Another very varied gallery of bird pictures:

http://www.pbase.com/mobish/all_duck_geese_swan_species

[Dreamwoven]

The magpie (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magpie) is generally considered to be among the most intelligent animals in the world. I've seen them in pairs taking turns to feed while the other looks on, then switching roles so they both get a turn at the food.

[Dreamwoven]

Saw a TV documentary on Emperor Penguin (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_penguin)s. Living in Antarctic both parents take care of the chick in turn, feeding the chick with partly digested fish. The hardest part is when the parents leave the chick to fend for itself.

[Dreamwoven]

I've been reading a novel set in the Outer Orkney isles of remote western Scotland, beyond the Isle of Skye. Skye is the furthest west I've been. Never been to the Outer Orkneys so it makes an interesting read, by Peter May The Black House, Quercus (2011). There is a chapter on a gannet colony of An Sgeir. They collect chicks, usually the middle one which was at a particular stage of development. It's dangerous work and using a rigged up system of pulleys to shift the chicks. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_gannet for more details.

[Danik 2016]

Saw a TV documentary on Emperor Penguin (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_penguin)s. Living in Antarctic both parents take care of the chick in turn, feeding the chick with partly digested fish. The hardest part is when the parents leave the chick to fend for itself.

The March of the Penguins. Complete French documentary about their life cicle spoken in English.

10/10.

http://docur.co/documentary/march-of-the-penguins

[Dreamwoven]

That's an amazing sight, Danik. I never knew Emperor Penguins migrated. Nor that they could travel such distances also on their bellies. I wonder if all penguins do this or just Emperors? I will view the entire 1.5 hours, but in manageable portions.

[Danik 2016]

I saw the movie in the cinema, spoken in French with Portuguese undertitles. I usually prefer fiction to documentarys but this one is very moving. But 1.5 on a small screen is a tough watch, I agree. I hope you enjoy this Penguin Odissey!

[Dreamwoven]

I was transfixed, and watched the whole through before late afternoon. What an amazing film, the rearing, feeding, and knife-edge survival in the harshest conditions imaginable, success or failure can mean one day is too late.


The experience is one I won't forget. Thank you Danik!

[Danik 2016]

I am glad you enjoyed it! I remember my own emotions. One almost forgets that it is a documentary. I thought the French narrator more atmospheric though.

[Dreamwoven]

The Hooded Crow (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hooded_crow) is a common bird in Sweden, quite intelligent, there are large flocks of them. We put out bird food to hang from a tree, and hooded crows come two-at-a-time, one keeps watch and the other feeds, before changing roles! But we have seen many hooded crows queuing to feed, perhaps 6 or more at a time. They are quite intelligent birds!

We don't have any neighbours where we live but we do have an old winnowing barn as our neighbour. The barn is still used by local small farmers who have formed a co-operative. We keep expecting the barn to be abandoned, it is rickety and looks to be on its last legs.

The Wikipedia item above is exclusively on the North American experience, but if you look up "winnowing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winnowing)" you will see a world-wide definition. Sorting the chaff from the seed has been dome for as long as agriculture has been practised. The winnowing barn attracts a lot of wild life like foxes that forage for food there. The last-but-one cat we had was killed by a fox, we found its fur in our back yard. The cat we have now is entirely indoors.

[Danik 2016]

.....

[Dreamwoven]

The Kingfisher (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingfisher) is particularly colourful and very efficient at fishing for small fish, diving sometimes surprisingly deep to catch a fish..

[Danik 2016]

.....

[Dreamwoven]

The rufous-collared sparrow is odd, osmoregulation? I guess its song is why its called tico-tico.

[Danik 2016]

.....

[Dreamwoven]

I think you are right about that.

[Danik 2016]

.....

[Danik 2016]

.....

[Dreamwoven]

Can you zoom in on some of these and if interesting write something about them.

[Danik 2016]

.....

[Dreamwoven]

Who would have thought that Adélie Penguins would be so curious and so different from other types like Emperor Penguins?

[Dreamwoven]

This post in Earth-Sky is abut how birds carry out group navigation to avoid crashing into one another: http://earthsky.org/earth/how-do-flocking-birds-move-in-unison?

[Danik 2016]

That´s beautiful!And it explains how the thicker zones with more birds spread to integrate the
general movement!

[Danik 2016]

double post

[Danik 2016]

Some pictures of birds from Sweden.

http://focusonnature.com/SwedenPhotoFeatureTour%2707.htm

[Dreamwoven]

Thanks, Danik, for that wonderful website on Swedish birds!

[Danik 2016]

You are welcome! Hope your health is mending!

[Danik 2016]

A very curious imitator (video):

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/birds/

[Danik 2016]

Canada Geese

https://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/goose_canada

[Dreamwoven]

Nice video!