BIRDS OF NORTH CAROLINA 



FIG. 57. WHITE-FRONTED GOOSE (adult). 



Genus Branta (Scop.) 



KEY TO SPECIES 



Comprises geese with the bill and feet black, and with at least some part of the 

 head black. 



1. Head entirely black. Brant. 



1. Head with some white. See 2. 



2. Head mainly black, with a triangular patch of white on each cheek, these joining under 



throat. Canada Goose. 

 2. Head mainly white, the lores, occiput, neck, and chest black. Barnacle Goose. 



70. Branta canadensis canadensis (Linn.}. CANADA GOOSE. 



Ads. -Throat and a large patch on side of head behind eye white or whitish; chin and rest 

 of head and neck black; back and wings grayish brown, more or less edged with lighter; tail 

 and shorter upper tail-coverts black, longer and lateral ones white; breast and belly grayish, 

 fading to white on lower belly; sides like back. Im. -Similar, but throat and cheeks sometimes 

 mixed with blackish. "L., 35.00-43.00; W., 15.60-21.00; Tar., 2.45-3.70; B., 1.55-2.70" (Ridgw.). 

 (Chap., Birds of E. N. A.) 



Range. -Temperate North America, breeding from the northern States northward to the tree 

 limit. 



Range in North Carolina. Mainly coastal region in winter. In the migrations likely to 

 occur anywhere in the State. 



In the days of early autumn comes to one's ears the deep trumpet-call of an old 

 gander, and looking up one may see a V-shaped flock of wild geese passing over, 

 their backs seeming to scrape the very sky. Few sights in nature so stir the imagi- 

 nation of mankind! Somewhere far to the north, perhaps on the tundras within 

 the shaclovv* of the frozen pole, these birds have passed the summer, and now upon 

 the approach of winter something calls them on their long journey, to be ended 

 only in the sounds of Carolina or maybe the lagoons of the Gulf Coast. 



About their summer homes many of them have been harassed by the Eskimo and 

 Indian, who pursued them with dogs when they were unable to fly during the molt- 



