GEESE 263 



regularly visiting one section of our islands and another 

 species another part, seldom straying far therefrom 

 unless, as previously remarked, they are driven to do so 

 through stress of weather or a failure of their food supply 

 from whatever cause arising. Our only resident goose, 

 the grey-lag, we find, winter and summer, in the vicinity 

 of its breeding haunts in the Outer Hebrides, from 

 whence, owing to the invariably mild character of the 

 winters experienced in those parts, it seldom has occasion 

 to stray. On the Scottish mainland, however, the grey- 

 lag is not so constant, being there subjected to greater 

 vicissitudes of climate. 



The western side of the British Islands would seem to 

 be the principal resort of another species of grey goose, 

 the white-fronted. They also appear to be remarkably 

 precise in their choice of feeding-grounds, showing a 

 preference for certain bays and estuaries. The white- 

 fronted geese regularly visit some of the western islands 

 of Scotland, and it is a singular fact that whilst they are 

 strongly attached to one spot or island, they will leave 

 others in the vicinity severely alone, although the latter, 

 apparently, are equally good as feeding-grounds. One 

 strong haunt of the white-fronted goose in England is at 

 Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire, where some 2000 to 

 3000 are to be found each winter from the first week in 

 December till March. At this place they have a secure 

 resting-place and feeding-ground in the large low-lying 

 grass-fields close by the estuary of the river Severn. 

 The white-fronted goose is not, however, the only mem- 

 ber of the grey goose family found at Berkeley Castle, 

 for both bean and pink-footed geese resort there also. 

 The two species last named are the first to arrive, usually 

 putting in an appearance about the third week in Sep- 



