96 GEESE 



Thomas Hutchins, an official of the Hudson's Bay Co., who, about 1785, spent 

 some time at Forts Albany and Severn, and described many of the birds found 

 there. 



COLLOQUIAL NAMES 



None. 



DESCRIPTION 



ADULTS, BOTH SEXES, (An eastern subspecies.) General pattern coloration 

 same as in the Common Canada Goose and Lesser Canada Goose. Smaller bird 

 than Lesser Canada Goose but somewhat larger than the dark-coloured, little 

 Cackling Goose of the West. 



JUVENILE. Moults and plumages similar to those of Common Canada Goose. 



SPECIMEN IDENTIFICATION 



See Common Canada Goose. 



FIELD MARKS 



The same as for Common Canada Goose, in miniature. 



VOICE. Taverner (1931) quotes Manley Miner as saying, "It does not honk 

 but cackles or clucks like an old hen scolding," and "their noise is k-r-r-r-r like 

 an old hen telling her chicks to look out for a hawk or calling her young to 

 feed k-r-r-r, a sort of trill." 



LIFE STORY 



The little Richardson's Goose was first described by Sir John Rich- 

 ardson in 1831, from a bird which was killed on June 19, 1822, on Mel- 

 ville Peninsula north of Hudson Bay. The original bird, a male, is now 

 in the Edinburgh Museum. Richardson named this bird Hutchins's 

 Goose, hutchinsi, after Mr. Hutchins of the Hudson's Bay Company. 



In the course of years Richardson's goose seems to have been over- 

 looked and its name hutchinsi has, for a long time, been erroneously 

 applied to the goose now known as the Lesser Canada Goose. 



In 1926, however, Soper (1928) found these little geese nesting in 

 southern Baffin Island, southeast of the Melville Peninsula, where the 

 subspecies was originally discovered. This constituted a re-discovery of 

 the race. Again in 1929 Soper found them nesting commonly on the 

 Foxe Basin coast of southwestern Baffin Island. Upon these facts becom- 

 ing known, the name hutchinsi, which meanwhile had been applied to 

 another goose, was re-bestowed upon its rightful owner, the little Rich- 

 ardson's Goose. 



The range of this variety of the Canada Goose group is now clearly 

 established; Taverner (1931) says: "Breeding in the eastern Arctic, it 

 migrates down Hudson Bay and through southern Manitoba, Nebraska, 

 Iowa, the Dakotas, and the Mississippi valley, wintering on the northern 

 gulf coast of Mexico." 



