The Lesser Snow Goose 



Taken in 

 Solano County 



man under his various disguises has a long lead over the poet in this coun- 

 try. The color is, of course, highly protective in a region of snow and ice, 

 such as this bird frequents in summer. Nor is it difficult to trace its pro- 

 tective significance in the case of pelicans, which sit along the margin 

 of some lake, like windrows of alkaline froth; nor in that of certain sea- 

 birds, whose white is the mere embodiment of storm-tossed billows. But 

 paint a game-bird white, and put the crazy notion into his noggin of 

 wintering in California — the case is quite hopeless. 



The great interior valley of California, the Sacramento-San Joaquin- 

 Tulare section, has been from time immemorial the winter home of 

 America's geese, and especially of the two Snow geese, Chen hyperboreus 

 and C. rossi. It is scarcely possible to exaggerate the number which 

 frequented this region before the advent of the white man. It must 

 have run into the millions, and may easily have reached the tens of mil- 

 lions. Practically the entire population of the North, breeding and bred 

 on the Arctic shores of British America, in Banks Land and, presumably, 

 upon the still undiscovered Hyperborean land mass, poured across the 

 defiles of the Sierras in late September and early October, and covered 

 the central California landscape as with a quivering white blanket. Of 

 their appearance in the Fifties Heermann wrote: 1 "Frequents more es- 

 pecially the salt marsh districts, though found also inland. The food 

 which they select in these localities gives their flesh a strong sedgy flavor, 

 which causes them to be but little esteemed. These birds often cover 

 so densely with their masses the plains in the vicinity of the marshes as 

 to give the ground the appearance of being clothed with snow. Easily ap- 

 proached on horseback, the natives sometimes near them in this manner 

 then suddenly putting spurs to their animals gallop into the flock, 



striking to the right and 

 left with short clubs and 

 trampling them beneath 

 their horses' feet. I 

 have known a native to 

 procure seventeen birds 

 ■HsattSABHHSHM in a single charge of this 



kind through a flock 

 covering several acres." 

 Gone are those days, 

 never to return. The 

 insatiable white man, 

 most barbarous of 



Photo by 

 W. W. Richards 



A GAGGLE OF WHITE GEESE 



ON THE SUISUN MARSHES 



p. 68. 



1 Rep. Pac. R. R. Surv., Vol. X. 



1846 



