Bird Sightings: Barnacle Geese

thewesternisles.co.uk

Wildlife Forum NEW Hebrides bird sightings Bird pictures A - Z Bird pictures: thumbnails Bird ringing Seal and dolphin rescue Difference dolphin porpoise Seal pups Bottlenose dolphin A dolphin rescue BDMLR

Overview Flowering now A - Z wildflowers White wildflowers Yellow wildflowers Pink wildflowers Purple - blue flowers Orchid notes

Stornoway Arch Project May garden

Websites directory Featured sites: Hebridean Baskets Artist Wille Fulton Boreas Knitwear Stornoway Arch Project

Bird Sightings : Hebrides : Barnacle Geese

Barnacle Geese

Branta leucopsis

Gaelic: Cathan

Photograph © Andy L
Tiumpanhead - Isle of Lewis - Outer Hebrides (Western Isles)
January 16th, 2008

"...what an awesome day it was today i did get out for a short time and managed to photograph a few barnacle geese there were approx 30 of them on loch Tiumpan Point and managed to get a couple of flight shots."

Our Barnacle Geese photographs :

Barnacle Geese
flock Barnacle Geese
flight Barnacle Geese
flight

Barnacle Goose

AKA: Rood Goose, Barny, Grollog

Branta leucopsis

UK AMBER LIST 1000 feral birds breeding, Winter visitors 67,000, (Oct - Mar) RSPB

Breeds: Nests: high cliffs North Atlantic Arctic Islands: East Greenland, Spitsbergen, Northern Russia

Winters: South of breeding area to South Europe

Habitat: Wetland meadows, marsh, rivers (estuaries on migration)

Diet: shoots, leaves

Medium-sized, sociable goose. Creamy-white face. Black head, neck & breast. White belly. Blue-grey barred back. Wings and its back silver-grey with black-and-white bars. Black tail.

Flight: V-shaped white rump patch & silver-grey underwing visible. Flies in packs & long lines, with barking, yapping chorus

Max recorded age 26yrs 8mths, typical lifespan 12yrs

Listen to a barnacle goose (RSPB site)

In the Arctic where Barnacle Geese breed Polar Bears are a problem, so the birds nest high on cliffs. When the 3 day old goslings are hungry they jump off the cliffs. Many of them die in this process. The surviving goslings then have a half mile hike to their feeding areas, stalked by Arctic foxes along the way.

Main Barnacle Goose Populations

Breeding Wintering Population

Eastern Greenland Hebrides 40,000

Svalbard Archipelago

(Between Norway & North Pole)
Solway Firth 24,000

Novaya Zemlya Archipelago

(North of Russia)
Netherlands 130,000

Baltic Sea islands

(Estonia, Finland, Denmark, and Sweden)
Netherlands 8,000

(Source WIKI)

Other local bird photographs

back to page top

Home • Contact Webmaster • Advertising