>Branta sandvicensis (Nene)

Nene (bird)

Nene
At Kilauea Point National Wildlife Refuge, Hawaii, USA
Conservation status
Vulnerable (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Anseriformes
Family:	Anatidae
Subfamily:	Anserinae
Tribe:	Anserini
Genus:	Branta
Species:	B. sandvicensis
Binomial name
Branta sandvicensis (Vigors, 1833)

The Nene, also known as Nēnē and Hawaiian Goose, (Branta sandvicensis) is a species of goose endemic to the Hawaiian Islands. The official bird of the state of Hawaiʻi, the Nene is exclusively found in the wild on the islands of Maui, Kauaʻi and Hawaiʻi. The Hawaiian name Nēnē comes from its soft call.

Evolution

The Nene evolved from the Canada Goose (Branta canadensis), which most likely migrated to the Hawaiian islands 500,000 years ago, shortly after the island of Hawaiʻi was formed. This ancestor is the progenitor of the Nene as well as the prehistoric Giant Hawaiʻi Goose and Nēnē-nui (Branta hylobadistes). The Nēnē-nui was larger than the Nene, varied from flightless to flighted depending on the individual, and inhabited the island of Maui. Similar fossil geese found on Oʻahu and Kauaʻimay be of the same species. The Giant Hawaiʻi Goose was restricted to the island of Hawaiʻi and measured 1.2 metres (3.9 ft) in length with a mass of 8.6 kilograms (19 lb), making it more than four times larger than the Nene. It is believed that the herbivorous Giant Hawaiʻi Goose occupied the same ecological niche as the goose-like ducks known as moa-nalo, which were not present on the Big Island.Based on mitochondrial DNA found in fossils, all Hawaiian geese, living and dead, are closely related to the Giant Canada Goose (B. c. maxima) and Dusky Canada Goose (B. c. occidentalis).

Description

Chick on Kauai

The Nene is a medium-sized goose at 41 centimetres (16 in) tall. Although they spend most of their time on the ground, they are capable of flight, with some individuals flying daily between nesting and feeding areas. Females have a mass of 1.525–2.56 kilograms (3.36–5.6 lb), while males average 1.695–3.05 kilograms (3.74–6.7 lb), 11% larger than females.Adult males have a black head and hindneck, buff cheeks and heavily furrowed neck. The neck has black and white diagonal stripes. Aside from being smaller, the female Nene is similar to the male in colouration. The adult's bill, legs and feet are black. It has soft feathers under its chin. Goslings resemble the male, but are a duller brown and with less demarcation between the colours of the head and neck, and striping and barring effects are much reduced. The bill, legs and feet are the same as for the adult.Its strong toes are padded and have reduced webbing, an adaptation that allows it to swiftly traverse rough terrain such as lava plains.

Habitat and range

The Nene could at one time be found on the islands of Hawaiʻi, Maui, Kahoʻolawe, Lānaʻi, Molokaʻi, and Kauaʻi. Today, its range is restricted to Hawaiʻi, Maui, Molokaʻi, and Kauaʻi. The Nene is an inhabitant of shrubland, grassland, coastal dunes, and lava plains, and related anthropogenic habitats such as pasture and golf courses from sea level to as much as 2,400 metres (7,900 ft). Some populations migrated between lowland breeding grounds and montane foraging areas.

Breeding

The breeding season of the Nene, from August to April, is longer than that of any other goose; most eggs are laid between November and January. Unlike most other waterfowl, the Nene mates on land. Nests are built by females on a site of their choosing, in which one to five eggs are laid (average is three on Maui and Hawaiʻi, four on Kauaʻi). Females incubate the eggs for 29 to 32 days, while the male acts as a sentry. Goslings are precocial, able to feed on their own; they remain with their parents until the following breeding season.

Diet

The Nene is a herbivore that will either graze or browse, depending on the availability of vegetation. Food items include the leaves, seeds,fruit, and flowers of grasses and shrubs.

Conservation

The Nene is the world's rarest goose. It is believed that it once was common, with approximately 25,000 Hawaiian Geese living in Hawaiʻi when Captain James Cook arrived in 1778.However, hunting and introduced predators, such as Small Asian Mongooses, pigs, and cats, reduced the population to 30 birds by 1952. However, this species breeds well in captivity, and has been successfully re-introduced; in 2004, it was estimated that there were 800 birds in the wild, as well as 1000 in wildfowl collections and zoos. However, there is some concern of inbreeding due to the small initial population of birds. The nature reserve, WWT Slimbridge, in England, was instrumental in the successful breeding of Hawaiian Geese in captivity. Under the direction of the leading conservationist Peter Scott, it was bred back from the brink of extinction during the 1950s for later re-introduction into the wild in Hawaiʻi. There are still Hawaiian Geese at Slimbridge today. They can now be found in captivity in every WWT centre. Successful introductions include Haleakala and Piʻiholo ranches on Maui.

Gallery

• 

  The distinctive neck pattern
 
• 

  Nene family
 
• 

  A group of Hawaiian Geese; the bird on the right shows the characteristic foot
 
• 

  A sign in Hawaiʻi warning of crossing Hawaiian Geese
 
• 

  Two Hawaiian Geese at the Kīlauea Point National Wildlife Refuge.
 
• 

  Group of Hawaiian Geese on the golf course of Waikoloa in April 2010.
 
• 

  Two Hawaiian Geese on Pali Trail between Māʻalaeaand Lāhainā
 
• 

  At  WWT Slimbridge in England
 
• 

  An illustration by Frederick William Frohawk

>Branta ruficollis (Red-breasted Goose)

Red-breasted Goose

Red-breasted Goose
Conservation status
Endangered (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Anseriformes
Family:	Anatidae
Subfamily:	Anserinae
Tribe:	Anserini
Genus:	Branta
Species:	B. ruficollis
Binomial name
Branta ruficollis (Pallas, 1769)
Synonyms
Rufibrenta ruficollis

The Red-breasted Goose (Branta ruficollis) is a brightly marked, endangered species of goose in the genus Branta from Eurasia. It is sometimes separated in Rufibrenta but appears close enough to the Brent Goose (Branta bernicla) to make this unnecessary, despite its distinct appearance.

Description

Red-breasted Goose swimming

All the species of the Branta genus are distinguished by their dark sooty colour, relieved by white, and as a distinction from the grey geese of the genus Anser. Among the species from these two genera, the Red-breasted Goose is the smallest at 53–56 centimetres (21–22 in) in length. This brightly marked species is unmistakable, but can be surprisingly difficult to find amongst Brent Geese. At long distances, the red of the breast tends to look dark, and the broad white stripe on the flank is more evident.

 

Distribution

The Red-breasted Goose breeds in Arctic Siberia, mainly on the Taymyr Peninsula, with smaller populations in the Gydan and Yamal peninsulas.Most winter along the northwestern shores of the Black Sea in Bulgaria,Romania and Ukraine (occasionally moving further southwest to Greece), but some winter in Azerbaijan.It is a rare vagrant to Great Britain and other western European areas, where it is sometimes found with flocks of Brent or Barnacle Geese.However, since it is common in captive wildfowl collections, escapees outside its usual range are fairly frequent.

Behaviour

Front view

The Red-breasted Goose often nests close to nests of birds of prey, such as Snowy Owls and Peregrine Falcons, which helps to protect this small goose from mammalian predators such as the Arctic Fox.

While wintering, the Red-breasted Goose feeds on grasses, leafs and seeds.

Conservation

The Red-breasted Goose is one of the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA) applies. It was considered a Vulnerable species by the IUCN. Over 80% of the population roost during the winter at just five sites, with nearby feeding areas threatened by changes in land use. In addition, there has been a strong decline in numbers in the last decades. As it is not clear to what extent the known population fluctuates in this species – as in other Arctic geese – and given the worsening outlook for the species as a whole, the Red-breasted Goose was uplisted from a species of Least Concern to Endangered status in the 2007 IUCN Red List.

>Branta hutchinsii (Cackling Goose)

Cackling Goose

Cackling Goose
Aleutian Cackling Goose Branta hutchinsii leucopareia
Conservation status
Least Concern (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Anseriformes
Family:	Anatidae
Subfamily:	Anserinae
Tribe:	Anserini
Genus:	Branta
Species:	B. hutchinsii
Binomial name
Branta hutchinsii (Richardson, 1832)
Subspecies
B. h. hutchinsii Richardson's Cackling Goose (Richardson, 1832) B. h. asiatica Bering Cackling Goose (Aldrich, 1946) (disputed; extinct) B. h. leucopareia Aleutian Cackling Goose (Brandt, 1836) B. h. taverneri Taverner's Cackling Goose (Delacour, 1951) B. h. minima Small Cackling Goose (Ridgway, 1885)
Synonyms
Branta canadensis hutchinsii

The Cackling Goose (Branta hutchinsii) is a North American bird of the genus Branta of blackgeese, which contains species with largely black plumage, distinguishing them from the grey Anser species.

The black head and neck with white "chinstrap" distinguish this goose from all except the larger Canada Goose (Branta canadensis) and the similarly sized Barnacle Goose (B. leucopsis). There are up to 5 subspecies of Cackling Goose, of varying sizes and plumage details. Some are hard to distinguish from the Canada Goose, with which the Cackling Goose was long assumed to form one species, the Cackling Goose and the smaller Canada Goose subspecies being called the Lesser Canada Goose. The smallest 1.4 kg-Cackling Geese (B. h. minima) are much smaller than any Canada Goose, but the subspecies B. h. hutchinsii, at up to 3 kg, grows to the same size as some Canada Geese. The distinctness of the extinct population of the Komandorski and Kuril Islands B. h. asiatica is controversial. The Barnacle Goose differs in having a black breast and grey, rather than brownish, body plumage.

This species is native to North America. It breeds in northern Canada and Alaska in a variety oftundra habitats. However, the nest is usually located in an elevated area near water. The eggs are laid in a shallow depression lined with plant material and down. Males can be very aggressive in defending territory. A pair may mate for life (up to around 20 years). The female looks virtually identical but is slightly lighter and has a different voice. Adult geese are often seen leading their goslings in a line with one parent at the front, and the other at the back of the "parade".

Like most geese, it is naturally migratory, the wintering range being most of the U.S., and locally in western Canada and northern Mexico. The calls overhead from large groups of Cackling Geese flying in V-shaped formation signal the transitions into spring and fall. In some areas, migration routes have changed due to changes in habitat and food sources.

Cackling Geese have occasionally reached western Europe naturally, as has been proved by ringing recoveries. The birds are of at least the subspecies hutchinsii, and possibly others. Cackling Geese are also found naturally on occasions in the Kamchatka Peninsula in eastern Siberia, eastern China, and throughout Japan.

These birds feed mainly on plant material. When feeding in water, they submerge their heads and necks to reach aquatic plants, sometimes tipping forward like a dabbling duck. Flocks of these birds often feed on leftover cultivated grains in fields, especially during migration or in winter. They also eat some insects, molluscs and crustaceans.

By the early 20th century, over-hunting and loss of habitat in the late 19th and early 20th centuries had resulted in a serious decline in the numbers of this bird in its native range. With improved game laws and habitat recreation and preservation programs, their populations have recovered in most of their range, although some local populations may still be declining, especially of the subspecies minima and leucopareia. Though the taxonomic distinctness of the Komandorski and Kuril Islands populations, which used to winter in Japan, is controversial, it is without doubt that they disappeared around 1929.

B. h. minima family

Systematics

The Cackling Goose was originally considered to be the same species or a subspecies of the Canada Goose, but in July 2004 the American Ornithologists' Union's (AOU) Committee on Classification and Nomenclature split the two into two species, making Cackling Goose into a full species with the scientific name Branta hutchinsii. The British Ornithologists Union followed suit in June 2005.

The AOU has divided the many associated subspeciesbetween both animals. To the present species were assigned:

• Richardson's Cackling Goose (Branta hutchinsii hutchinsii)
• Aleutian Cackling Goose (Branta hutchinsii leucopareia)
• Small Cackling Goose (Branta hutchinsii minima)
• Taverner's Cackling Goose (Branta hutchinsii taverneri)
• †Bering Cackling Goose (Branta hutchinsii asiatica) - doubtfully distinct from B. h. leucopareia; extinct (c.1929)

The distinctions between the two geese have led to a great deal of confusion and debate among ornithologists. This has been aggravated by the overlap between the small types of Canada Goose and larger types of Cackling Goose. Most interestingly, the old "Lesser Canada Goose" was believed to be a partly hybrid population, with the birds named taverneri considered a mixture of minima, occidentalis and parvipes. In addition, it has been determined that the Barnacle Goose is a derivative of the Cackling Goose lineage, whereas the Hawaiian Goose is an insular representative of the Canada Goose.

A recent proposed revision by Harold Hanson suggests splitting Canada and Cackling Goose into six species and 200 subspecies. This radical nature of this proposal has provoked surprise in some quarters; Richard Banks of the AOU urges caution before any of Hanson's proposals are accepted.

>Branta leucopsis (Barnacle Goose)

Barnacle Goose

Barnacle Goose
Conservation status
Least Concern (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Anseriformes
Family:	Anatidae
Subfamily:	Anserinae
Tribe:	Anserini
Genus:	Branta
Species:	B. leucopsis
Binomial name
Branta leucopsis (Bechstein, 1803)

The Barnacle Goose (Branta leucopsis) belongs to the genus Branta of black geese, which contains species with largely black plumage, distinguishing them from the grey Anser species. Despite its superficial similarity to the Brent Goose, genetic analysis has shown it is an eastern derivative of the Cackling Goose lineage.

Taxonomy and naming

The Barnacle Goose was first classified taxonomically by Johann Matthäus Bechstein in 1803. Its specific epithet is from the Ancient Greek leuko- "white", and opsis "faced".

In English, the term "barnacle" originally referred only to this species of goose and only later to the crustacean barnacles. It is sometimes claimed that the word comes from a Celtic word for "limpet", but the sense-history seems to go in the opposite direction.

Description

In flight

The Barnacle Goose is a medium-sized goose, 55–70 cm (22–28 in) long, with a wingspan of 130–145 cm (51–57 in) and a body mass of 1.21–2.23 kg (2.7–4.9 lb). It has a white face and black head, neck, and upper breast. Its belly is white. The wings and its back are silver-gray with black-and-white bars that look like they are shining when the light reflects on it. During flight a V-shaped white rump patch and the silver-gray underwing linings are visible.

Distribution

A flock of Barnacle Geese feeding at Helsinki, Finland

Barnacle Geese breed mainly on the Arctic islands of the North Atlantic. There are three main populations, with separate breeding and wintering ranges; from west to east:

• Breeding in eastern Greenland, wintering on the Hebrides of western Scotland and in westernIreland. Population about 40,000.
• Breeding on Svalbard, wintering on the Solway Firth on the England/Scotland border. Population about 24,000.
• Breeding on Novaya Zemlya, wintering in the Netherlands. Population about 130,000.
• A new fourth population, derived from the Novaya Zemlya population, has become established since 1975 breeding on the Baltic Sea islands (Estonia, Finland, Denmark, and Sweden), and wintering in the Netherlands. Population about 8,000.

Small numbers of feral birds, derived from escapes from zoo collections, also breed in other north European countries. Occasionally, a wild bird will appear in the Northeastern United States or Canada, but care must be taken to separate out wild birds from escaped individuals, as Barnacle Geese are popular waterfowl with collectors.

Ecology, behavior and life history

Flock on autumn migration

Barnacle Geese frequently build their nests high on mountain cliffs; away from predators (primarilyArctic Foxes and Polar Bears) but also away from food. Like all geese, the goslings are not fed by the adults. Instead of bringing food to the newly hatched goslings, the goslings are brought to the ground. Unable to fly, the three day old goslings jump off the cliff and fall; their small size, feathery down, and very light weight helps to protect some of them from serious injury when they hit the rocks below, but many die from the impact. Arctic foxes are attracted by the noise made by the parent geese during this time and capture many dead or injured goslings. The foxes also stalk the young as they are led by the parents to wetland feeding areas.

Its call is a "kaw".

Conservation

In Helsinki Zoo, Finland

The Barnacle Goose is one of the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA) applies. According to Sveriges ornitologiska förening the geese began breeding in Sweden in 71, and according to Skansen it was 40 years ago, more or less, when the entire population of Barnacle Geese left in the autumn to return in spring, soon after they began breeding in the wild.

Folklore

Barnacle Geese. Facsimile of an Engraving on Wood, from the "Cosmographie Universelle" of Munster, folio, Basle, 1552.

The natural history of Barnacle Goose was long surrounded with a legend claiming that they were born of driftwood:

Nature produces [Bernacae] against Nature in the most extraordinary way. They are like marsh geese but somewhat smaller. They are produced from fir timber tossed along the sea, and are at first like gum. Afterwards they hang down by their beaks as if they were a seaweed attached to the timber, and are surrounded by shells in order to grow more freely. Having thus in process of time been clothed with a strong coat of feathers, they either fall into the water or fly freely away into the air. They derived their food and growth from the sap of the wood or from the sea, by a secret and most wonderful process of alimentation. I have frequently seen, with my own eyes, more than a thousand of these small bodies of birds, hanging down on the sea-shore from one piece of timber, enclosed in their shells, and already formed. They do not breed and lay eggs like other birds, nor do they ever hatch any eggs, nor do they seem to build nests in any corner of the earth.

The legend was widely repeated in, for example, Vincent of Beauvais's great encyclopedia. However, it was also criticized by other medieval authors, including Albertus Magnus.

Juvenile

This belief may be related to the fact that these geese were never seen in summer, when they were supposedly developing underwater (they were actually breeding in remote Arctic regions) in the form of barnacles—which came to have the name "barnacle" because of this legend.

Based on these legends—indeed, the legends may have been invented for this purpose—some Irish clerics considered Barnacle Goose flesh to be acceptable fast day food, a practice that was criticized by a contemporary Welsh author:

...Bishops and religious men (viri religiosi) in some parts of Ireland do not scruple to dine off these birds at the time of fasting, because they are not flesh nor born of flesh.... But in so doing they are led into sin. For if anyone were to eat of the leg of our first parent (Adam) although he was not born of flesh, that person could not be adjudged innocent of eating meat.

At the Fourth Council of the Lateran (1215), Pope Innocent III explicitly prohibited the eating of these geese during Lent, arguing that despite their unusual reproduction, they lived and fed like ducks and so were of the same nature as other birds.

The question of the nature of Barnacle Geese also came up as a matter of Jewish dietary law in the Halakha, and Rabbeinu Tam (1100–71) determined that they were kosher (even if born of trees) and should be slaughtered following the normal prescriptions for birds.

>Branta bernicla nigricans (Black brant)

Black brant

Black Brant
Black Brant
Conservation status
Least Concern (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Anseriformes
Family:	Anatidae
Subfamily:	Anserinae
Tribe:	Anserini
Genus:	Branta
Species:	B. bernicla
Subspecies:	B. b. nigricans
Trinomial name
Branta bernicla nigricans (Lawrence, 1846)

The Black Brant or Pacific Brent Goose, Branta bernicla nigricans, is a sub-species of the Brent Goose that breeds in Alaska and winters in Baja California. There are an estimated 115,000 black brant in the world and about 14,000 are taken each year by hunters. Fox predation of eggs is thought to be significant and, in 2006, the U.S. began a 5-year fox removal program. The population has been as high as 200,000; in 1981, and as low as 100,000; in 1987.

Black Brant