This white goose was photographed at Benbrook Lake, near Fort
Worth, Texas in late November 1999 by Patty Williams. Note the
rather long bill with a slight bulge over the nostrils and strong
"grinning patch", limited bluish-gray patch basally
on the bill, and the straight edge to most of the bill base feathering
except for a strong indentation at the top - to me these all point
strongly to a hybrid Snow x Ross's Goose:
- I scanned a couple of my pics of a Ross's Goose that wintered
with some tame geese last year (Dec 98 - Feb 99) at Lake Worth,
intending to use them as a benchmark against which to measure
the bill features of the above bird - but instead found myself
wondering about the parentage of even this individual; is the
very strong "grinning patch" shown by this bird within
the normal range of variation for pure Ross's Goose? - all the
photos I can find show birds with a much less-striking "grinning
patch" - yet the bill shape and extent of blue (complete
with small protuberances) appears normal for this species:
In addition to the top individual photographed by Patty, there
are three "white geese roosting most evenings (since Nov
25 until at least Dec 13, 1999) at Benbrook Lake: an adult blue
Snow, an apparent immature white Ross's (appears to have right
size and bill shape), and an adult white bird that looks to be
intermediate between the other two birds in size and bill shape.
Given the huge increase in both Snow and Ross's Geese - especially
on the shared wintering grounds where individuals may end up moving
north mixed in with the wrong species - can we expect to see an
increase in hybrids?
