420 THE BIRDS OF YORKSHIRE. 



the description ; not a migratory species)." (British Associa- 

 tion Report, 1858, pp. 131-132.).* 



Notwithstanding that Strickland preferred to call the Wild 

 Geese of Yorkshire ' Bean Geese/ yet he was careful to make 

 it clear that his Bean Goose was not the Bean Goose of Yarrell, 

 Gould, and Morris, and the Bean Goose of to-day. His descrip- 

 tions and measurements of the beak, etc., show that his bird 

 was in reality the Pink-footed Goose, hence his supposition 

 that the Bean Goose derives its name from ' its coming in 

 the time of bean harvest ' rests on no foundation. 



The belief in the Bean Goose being the common Wild 

 Goose of the county was still held, and it was not until a 

 quarter of a century after Strickland's paper was printed that 

 the real identity of the bird was established. 



In February 1883, Mr. J. E. Harting, the editor of the Field 

 newspaper, published an article on Grey Geese, in which it 

 was stated that the Pink- footed Goose was nowhere to be 

 found in any numbers except perhaps in the Hebrides. Mr. 

 F. Boyes questioned this statement, and brought facts from 

 his own observation and experience to prove that the Pink- 

 footed Goose was the common Wild Goose of the Yorkshire 

 Wolds and the Humber basin. To this Mr. Harting replied 

 " The statement that the Pink-footed Goose is the common 

 Wild Goose of the Yorkshire Wolds is most interesting, and 

 we should be glad if other correspondents would furnish in- 

 formation as to the particular species of Grey Geese which 

 visit their respective districts in winter, etc." Numerous 

 letters followed, and the result of the inquiry conclusively 

 proved that the Pink-footed Goose, and not the Bean Goose, 

 was, and is, the common migratory Grey Goose both of York- 

 shire and also of Eastern England. 



The distribution of the Pink-footed Goose in Yorkshire 

 is confined almost entirely to the Wold district and the Hum- 



* Mr. Eagle Clarke informs me that, according to Alpheraky's 

 Monograph on the "Geese of Europe and Asia" (1905), Strickland's 

 A. paludosus is probably the Yellow-billed Bean Goose, the Anscr 

 arvensis of Brehm, which is said to be a commoner visitor to Britain 

 than the true Bean Goose, A. segetum. 



