Snow Goose

Here's someone I hadn't seen at Duke Farms before, a pair of Snow Geese. This probably isn't outside their range, though they were new to me. They were on Heron Lake.

Snow Geese are known to congregate in large flocks. I don't know how this pair got separated from a larger group of Snow Geese, but I suspect that in the absence of other Snow Geese they joined in with the next best thing: a flock of Canada Geese. There are also a pair of Mallards in the back, but they were just passing through; before and after the picture the Mallards were in different parts of the lake.

Although Canada Geese have some reputation for being aggressive, I don't think I've ever seen them mistreating other waterfowl. I suppose the dynamic changes if they had vulnerable goslings around, but this time of year they seem accepting of the presence of the Snow Goose cousins.

December 17, 2021 at Duke Farms
Photo 174171294, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Peck's Skipper

Image
A Peck's Skipper was checking out a daisy last summer. I think this skipper was named after an entomologist, George William Peck, who died in May of 1909 based on this: We regret to record the death of another of our veteran entomologists, in the person of Mr. George W. Peck, of Roselle Park, N. J. He died on the 18th of May, at the age of seventy-two; he was born in Boston and was a descendant of one of the Mayflower Pilgrims. After being engaged in business in Boston for some years, he removed to New York and became the part owner and head of a wholesale business in glass and tin supplies.  His heart, however, was engrossed with nature studies, and he acquired no little reputation in his own neighbourhood as an entomologist and horticulturist. His collection of Lepidoptera is one of the best in New Jersey.  He never made any contributions to entomological publications, but, being an enthusiastic collector, he was well known to a great many. Despite the kind words from a fel...
Read more

Princess Tree

Image
I was in the Research Woods part of Duke Farms this winter when I saw what looked like an unusual nut shell, including some that were still on the tree. My belief is that this is from a Princess Tree (aka Empress Tree aka Foxglove Tree). (It sounds like it's not a true nut, and that the shell should have a bunch of small seeds that mostly disperse through the wind.) Princess Trees have a couple things in common with the catalpas I discussed yesterday: Neither is native to New Jersey. Both have unusually large leaves, sometimes causing them to be confused with 1 another. Since the US doesn't have princesses, you might be suspicious that a Princess Tree isn't native to the country, and you'd be right [1]. It sounds like the names Princess Tree and Empress Tree both refer to Anna Pavlovna , a Russian princess who married into the Netherlands royal family [2]. The Princess Tree is considered a pioneer tree , being 1 of the 1st trees to appear as a meadow begins its transi...
Read more

Hummingbird Clearwing

Image
These are one of my favorite moths, the Hummingbird Clearwing : They're big enough to see without (much) difficulty. They're colorful enough to take a good picture. They can be found in places I go to find butterflies and other pollinators; I don't need to go someplace I wouldn't be anyway. If I mistake something else for the Hummingbird Clearwing, that something else is also pretty cool (usually an actual Ruby-throated Hummingbird or their Snowberry Clearwing moth cousins). Unfortunately this is the only picture I've gotten of them this season. I was scouting around Oak Meadow to see what was around a couple days before the annual Duke Farms Butterfly Count when I saw this one hovering around the Wild Bergamot . It's claimed that these moths are migratory but I haven't found anything on where they spend the winter. Their range goes pretty far into Canada, so it wouldn't surprise me if they overwinter here in NJ. If they do, their strategy is to be rea...
Read more