last weekend i was visiting my daughter and her family. we took a walk to a playground for the children and on the way passed a small half frozen pond with lots of birds. this photo is of a barnacle goose (Branta leucopsis). at first we thought it to be a canada goose which is an invasive species here so we were not too impressed. a little research however revealed that this was a barnacle goose which i have never seen before and is not common in these parts of southern norway.
it nests in greenland or spitsbergen in the arctic far north of norway and overwinters in great britain or in the mediterranean. the small group we saw must be under migration so i was very happy to see them on their brief stopover. there were other people around and these geese did not seemed disturbed by our presence. perhaps people fed them but there were a flock of black-headed gulls that were very aggressive when somebody threw any food. these geese sat very still and seemed uninterested. being on a break from migration they were surely in need of some rest. they have likely flown a long ways already but still have to fly another two thousand kilometers to get to their breeding grounds!
Hey there, thank you for this beautiful picture and a lot of interesting text! Great entry :)