Monday, March 21, 2011

Snow Geese

Spring is coming!  Last week, hundreds of thousands of snow geese flew through this South Dakota flyway.  Amazing to watch!  They fly in a V formation, but not as precise as Canadian geese do.  Sometimes the line is longer on one side of the V than the other, or 3 or 4 fly in the middle of the big V.  If you stand and watch a lone goose, it flies harder and faster than the others, and pulls into place somewhere in the line.  They change places frequently, although that is harder to track as they go overhead.  Sometimes they are quite high, another flock might be lower, and almost directly under them.  One group landed south of us to feed and we watched as they took to the air, and got into their V's.  Since their wing tips are black, if they are high, you don't at first think they are white.  When they are lower, you can see plainly their white bodies.  The juveniles are not yet white either.  A sight to behold!

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