68 BIRDS OF ALABAMA 



museum specimen. It proved to be the typical form of the 

 species. 



Avery records the Canada goose as a rare winter resident 

 at Greensboro, and McCormack found it moderately common 

 &t Leighton — noted between October 23 and March 13. 

 Brown, writing from Coosada, says that a large flock spent 

 the winter of 1877-78 in a cornfield, on the banks of the Coosa 

 River, and left for the North about the second week in March.* 



Wild geese are still numerous every winter in the vicinity 

 of Montgomery. On the coast they apparently are not com- 

 mon, though found occasionally. One was reported at Bayou 

 liabatre about March 20, 1912, 



In 1915 geese were reported to have arrived at Muscle 

 Shoals during the first week in October. Northbound mi- 

 grants were first seen at CarroUton, March 14, 1887, and 

 March 15, 1888. 



General habits. — During their stay in Alabama, wild geese 

 live mainly on the larger rivers and ponds, roosting at night 

 on sand bars or on rocks in the shoals, and feeding in near-by 

 fields of wheat or corn. They gather into large flocks and 

 in flight assume regular formations, either straight lines or 

 V-shaped ranks. They are at all times wary and while feed- 

 ing provide against surprise by posting sentinels at various 

 points. The usual method of hunting them is to conceal one's 

 self before daylight in a shock of corn or a pit in a field where 

 the birds are known to feed and await their arrival at or soon 

 after daybreak. In the Tennessee River at Muscle Shoals 

 many are killed by hunters concealed in piles of drift on the 

 little islands or "towheads" (as they are called), or in boxes 

 sunk in the shallower part of the river. If a good place has 

 been selected and particularly if the weather is misty or foggy, 

 some of the flocks of geese in their flights up and down the 

 stream are almost certain to pass over the hunter close enough 

 for a shot. 



Food habits. — ^The Canada goose subsists principally upon 

 the stems, leaves, and roots of sedges and other aquatic plants, 

 corn and other grain gleaned in the fields, and the tender 

 shoots of jvheat and various grasses. Audubon mentions 



•Brown, N. C, Bull, ifuttall Omith. Club, vol. 4, p. 13, 1879. 



