Nature Done Wright

Last week, Bill Kempey mentioned that a Canada Goose with a band on its left leg was among all the geese (and two Mute Swans) hanging out at the Warden's Watch.

When I saw that the geese were still around yesterday, I attempted to photograph the  leg band.

With Sally Techson's help, I found the aforementioed goose and managed to photograph the band from two angles (no easy task).

I then went to the home page of the USGS' Bird Bnading Laboratory, which has a fairly straightforward process to enter the information.

Long story short: the Canada Goose had a butt-end band, and my photos apparently had only eight of the nine digits needed for an I.D.

Photographing all nine would have required getting unobstructed photos from at least three angles, which leads me to believe that these banded geese are often I.D.'d– if they are I.D.'d at all — after they're dead.

I took an educated guess at the missing number (telling the lab of my guess) and submitted the info. We'll see if I get a reply.

(I will post any information I receive.)

The larger question is, who really cares about the numbers on a butt-end band on a ubiquitous Canada Goose?

The answer, for me, is that I kind of stopped looking at these loud creatures with any interest long ago, and if I were able to learn how old one of them was, and where it was banded (probably as a young goose), I might think of them in a slightly new light.

Now, if anyone wants to try to photograph the first number on the band…. (Better hurry; I think they're hanging out at the Warden's Watch because they are molting, and it only last so long.)

(Thanks, Bill and Sally!)