TEE URCHIN S “GOOSE: 831 
The goose problem is all mixed up. It would be so much more convenient 
if the four races of B. canadensis were separated from each other by impassable 
mountain barriers. ‘They must raise social barriers in nesting time; but in winter 
they are all too friendly, each to each, in Washington. Hear what a trouble a 
visiting ornithologist* has with the situation: ‘‘Intergrades connect any series of 
Washington birds of this group so completely that it is impossible to class every 
individual by its size or coloration. ‘Three specimens obtained from the same 
flock may be severally referred to hutchinsvi and occidentalis, one of them being 
intermediate between hutchinsti and occidentalis, and another between hutchinsii 
and minima. All Canada Geese secured on my trip were secured at Nisqually 
in April and were migrants. If Mr. Fannin’s statements were based on authentic 
records and specimens taken in the proper season, canadensis and hutchinsii breed 
in the same localities on the mainland, a state of affairs unknown east of the 
Rockies and inconsistent with their classification as it now stands in the books. 
The bulk of Pacific Coast specimens examined present a most puzzling constancy 
in their intermediate size coupled with an inconstancy of coloration which makes 
their classification by the most adjustable formula of little value.” 
This much at least is plain, that the B. canadensis type becomes dwarfed as 
we proceed in a northwesterly direction. The summer aspect of the species, 
therefore, is somewhat as follows: Branta canadensis occupies the interior of 
British North America including eastern British Columbia and the northern 
border states, including eastern Washington. B. c. occidentalis is a darker Pacitic 
Coast form, having its center of abundance in western British Columbia, but 
extending as far north as Sitka, and intergrading with C. typicus along the eastern 
border of its range. B.c. hutchinsu, a dwarfing form, intergrades with C. typicus 
in northern British Columbia and in eastern Alaska, and occupies the southern 
portion of Alaska proper and the shores of Bering Sea. B. c. minima inosculates 
with B. c. hutchinsi along the northern borders of the latter’s range, and extends 
thence northward to the limit of land. Minima not only dwarfs hutchinsii, but 
exhibits the same tendency to vary from it in pattern of coloration which 
occidentalis does from typicus. In plumage, therefore, canadensis proper and 
hutchinsu form one group, and occidentalis with minima another. But whereas 
~there is evidence of intergradation between c. and h. there is no such evidence 
as between 0. and m. ‘This, of course, is “caviare to the general,” and no offense! 
Shun it! 
THESE little Geese are common on both sides of the mountains during 
migration, and a few winter. Except in the matter of wheat-fields, which are 
irresistible, the birds rather prefer the mud-flats and marshes for both bed and 
board. Because of their northern extraction, they are not so wary as the 
more experienced Canadas, and their honking is a little lighter in character; 
but further than this the scales and the tape must record all that is interesting 
in hutchinsti as over canadensis. 
a. Samuel N. Rhoads in “The Birds Observed in British Columbia and Washington During Spring 
and Summer 1892.’ Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila. 1893, p. 34. 
