Despite the sluggish autumn waterfowl migration in central Missouri, I was fortunate to encounter about 60 greater white-fronted geese this morning. Ironically, I had just returned from a rather unremarkable birding excursion when the geese passed over our house, flying northwest to southeast.
No doubt, they were catching tail winds provided by the most recent storm system that is moving from the Northern Plains to the Great Lakes region. These geese, having summered and bred in Alaska or Northwest Canada, are heading for the Lower Mississippi River Valley or the Western Gulf Coast where they will spend the winter. They are common spring (February-March) and fall migrants here in central Missouri.
The expansion of crop fields has benefited both snow geese and greater white-fronted geese (not to mention Canada geese). The abundance of waste grain offers a reliable source of nutrition during their long migrations and has actually expanded their winter range northward, into the central Mississippi Valley and across the Southern Plains.
Addendum: Flocks of snow geese were also reported over Columbia on this day.
