Blue

A blue morph snow goose. I don't think I've seen one before, except maybe (probably) in the middle of one of those flocks of thousands of honking, flapping, swarming whites. This one was feeding peacefully on the lawn at Tyee Spit.

The paler geese are probably juvenile whites.

Sharing the lawn, eclipsed by the showier geese, three wigeons watch me.

A confusion of snow geese

Several hundred snow geese were resting peacefully in a field on Westham Island beside a little-used lane. Then a car went by:

A honking, flapping, scrambling panic attack, seen through blackberry canes.

A more conventional view, after Laurie had fought his way through the blackberries.

"This neighbourhood has gone to the geese," complains little owl.

Halfway across Westham Island, on our way to the Reifel Island Migratory Bird Sanctuary, our lonely road was hosting a traffic jam. All along the ditch side, wherever a car could park two wheels safely, the space was taken. In smaller flattish areas, photographers had set up digiscopes and tripods.

We saw the owl first, a tiny one, perched on a wire above the ditch. There was no place to park, so I drove on, slowly. At the corner, the field was full of snow geese. The tripods were thick here, too; there was no room for us, and I kept on going. Halfway to the next bend in the road, I found a spot where I could park without dropping Laurie in the ditch. Here, the snow goose flock was thinned out, but ahead, at the turn, the field was a solid mass of white birds, and no tripods.

I walked back, hoping to see the owl; Laurie went forward, to the closest flock of geese. Just as he got there (and about the time I arrived at the first corner) his whole flock lifted into the air, wheeled and came down to join my flock.

The first wave.

The flock in flight.

Spreading out, honking as they go.

What a din and ruckus they were making! Each goose had to announce to anyone within earshot (and a far-reaching earshot it was) why and how and where they were going. Or maybe they power the wings on sound waves. Or they're measuring their position in the flying mob like bats, with sonar. Something, anyhow.

The hullabaloo only got worse when they came in for a landing on the field my flock was using.  Cries of "Move over, I'm coming down!" vying with shouts from the land; "Not here! Over there! Hi, friend! Not you! Go away! What news? Ouch! Watch where you're going! ..."  Eventually, all were down, and the clamour subsided.

I turned back to the road. The owl had gone. A returning photographer told me he'd up and left as soon as the geese arrived with their racket. But he was "over there", sulking in a tangle of winter-bare branches high in a tree; I could barely see a dark patch against the light.

Oh, well. The geese were beautiful and well worth the walk.

One lone goose, beside the full ditch.

Geese love a muddy field. The wetter, the sloppier, the goopier, the better. These two fields are ideal, and the geese congregate around the muddiest spots, the gate and the tracks left by farm tractors. How they ever stay so white amazes me.

Sticky, mushy mud. And water, to check their white shirt fronts for spots in.

More reflections.

This reflection seems to have been attached backwards.

Afterwards, I decided to have a go at the owl; maybe the camera would do better than my eyes. Yes, it would, but not much. I had to play with the photos in Picnik, fading the branches and defining the bird, until I got something good enough to identify it as an owl, at least.

Northern hawk-owl. (Thanks, Hugh.)

Heads I lose. And win.

It was a toss-up; Terra Nova on the south of the airport, or Iona Beach, on its north. We were looking for waterfowl; Laurie mentioned snow geese. I picked Iona Beach, thinking of cormorants off the jetty. Wrong choice. Not only was there not a goose to be seen, the tide was high and except for a mixed flock of ducks and coots on the far side of one lagoon, a couple of lonely crows and one long-legged wader, the place was birdless.

But there's always something ...

Quiet lagoon

Mushroom that looks like a flower. Or a hat.

Flower that looks like a butterfly.

These grow wild all over the dunes.

Shy beauty

Tiny 'shroom and moss

Wooly bear

I think this is a whimbrel.

Just leaving.

Someone will tell me now that all the geese were down at Terra Nova.

No paraskevidekatriaphobia for us!

Friday the 13th. This one was Laurie's birthday. We bought Raku ware at a pottery sale in the morning, and a bark carving at a craft fair in the afternoon. In between, ...

The bottom half of the field.

... we passed a mixed field of seagulls, snow geese, and trumpeter swans, with a trio of Canada geese thrown in for contrast. The wind was up, and geese flew slowly overhead, fighting the breeze.

Lunch in our favourite spot in Ladner, then a visit to the harbour:

The Fraser Delta Wetlands

Reflections in the river

Stripy shed and blue boat, reflected

Moody skies, cheerful trees. And a heron posing as a weather vane.

Back to the road again. Along Highway 10, at the Centennial heritage site (1867-1967) ...

Window detail, St. Stephen's United Church

... we found mushrooms in the lawn, with rabbit pellet decorations.

In the north, new snow capped the mountains,

and to the south,  masses of clouds pushed and shoved each other around the sky.

Highway 99, just across the field.

Stormclouds hovered, dumped rain, lifted and moved on. The sun came out again.

Just another perfect November day.

A Skywatch post.

Stopping on the bridge

Crossing back to the mainland from Westham Island, last week, we stopped at the bridge to look for waterfowl.

Looking East, upriver.

Another field of Snow Geese, and a family of Mallards.

Choppy water. One lonely seagull sits on a post.

On the mainland side of the river, there's a nice patch of reeds and grasses. And usually a fair collection of birds. This time, they were mallards and widgeons, and a heron. And these:

A pair of white geese, sleeping on a floating plank.

Or waking, to watch us. But keeping their bills warm.

And at the foot of the bridge, a pair of eagles watched us from their nest.


They had something up there; the one on the left bent over to deal with it a couple of times. Supper, probably.
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Snow Geese! Thousands of Snow Geese!

We had gone to Westham Island to look for snow geese. We weren't too hopeful; last year, we missed them entirely. So we dawdled. We stopped at the side of the road to photograph pumpkins, and I discovered an interesting farm, so we poked around there for a goodish bit, (photos later). It was bitterly cold, with a sharp wind, and we weren't dressed for it. We froze.

While we were out in the fields, the geese flew high overhead. Long lines of them, Vs, and small flocks, moving west. We aimed at the sky and took photos until Laurie's battery ran out.

Snow geese, too high, flying too fast.

So we were happy; we had seen the geese. When they had gone, we finished the tour of the farm, bought fruit and veggies, talked to the owners. No rush, except that our teeth were chattering.

The car was deliciously warm, afterwards, and a cup of hot tea back in Ladner was calling to us. But we were almost at the end of the road; may as well check it out.

Two fields farther along, there they were:


Luckily, I had changed Laurie's camera batteries. We stood on the edge of the ditch, and took photo after photo; we couldn't stop. Every instant there was another marvellous configuration of geese, and another, and another. On the ground, in the air, far overhead and close enough, almost, to touch.




From where we stood, we could see two large fields full of geese. At one point, from another field that we couldn't see, a wave of geese suddenly lifted into the air, honking madly. They wheeled overhead, and settled somewhere behind a farmhouse. There must have been thousands just in those three fields alone.

Here's one field, just the central portion. Count them, if you can.


I was thinking, seeing them fill the sky, how it must have been for the earliest settlers, back when there was no city, when bird populations were at their peak; it must have seemed that the supply was infinite, inexhaustible. And yet, here we are, with extinctions in the offing. (Not the snow geese, at present; they're doing a bit too well for their own good. Link, see the bottom of the page.)

Enough; my teeth were chattering. We got back in the car and drove on. Two fields more, and another field of geese. We took photos there, too.


This one was standing guard. When he raised the alarm, "Photographers! Scatter!" half the field rose up, looked us over, and settled down to eat again.


The grass got in the way of this shot, but I like it because of the wing action. The geese fly with their legs up against the tail, but coming down, they drop them down into a forward-facing angle, and stretch their necks downward. An awkward-looking position, but it works for them.


It was odd: the geese were raising a constant chorus of honks, a choir several hundred voices strong. With the car window rolled down, we could hear them long before we were close enough to see them. And yet, in all the time we watched, I only saw this one with a beak open to shout.

On to the next field. The last before the entrance to Reifel, which was closed to the public. Never mind; that last field had a gate that we could lean over, instead of a ditch full of blackberries.



How do they keep so clean, puddling about in the mud like that?

One last photo, unfocused; where do you focus in this situation? I love the flurry of wings.


We turned and went back to Ladner for tea and coffee. Not without stopping several times to look at ducks and eagles and a pair of non-snow geese.

Coffee, tea, a warm blueberry muffin for Laurie, a beef samosa for me, nicely steaming. And a bit of a fireplace ... Ahhhh!
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