[Bristol-Birds] State kicks off goose banding in Bristol Tennessee
- From: "Wallace Coffey" <jwcoffey@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Bristol-birds" <bristol-birds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 24 Jun 2008 17:41:36 -0400
Tim White, the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency's, Waterfowl
Program Coordinator, was in Bristol Tennessee this morning as the
agency kicked off its Canada Goose banding program for East
Tennessee. Similar efforts will be conducted across the state.
He was with a team of eight agency personnel including biologist,
technicians, summer interns and the like who captured and banded
128 adult Canada Geese at Steele Creek Park Lake.
White, who is out of the Nashville headquarters of TWRA, arrived
with the Region IV crew headed up by Wildlife Biologist Dan Gibbs
of the Morristown office at Talbott, TN.
All of the birds captured in nets this morning were birds from a
previous hatching year and considered adults. No goslings of the
current nesting season were banded. One bird was captured which
had been banded elsewhere but the biologists said they had not
yet had a chance to check their records to determine where it
had been banded.
It has been two or three years since TWRA has had a crew on
the road in the region. They previously captured and banded birds
at Kingsport.
Banding is a fundamental tool for assessing the impact of hunting
regulations on Canada goose populations. To obtain information
on survival, direct recovery rates, harvest rates, harvest distribution,
and the impacts of hunting regulations on giant Canada geese,
a coordinated giant Canada goose banding program has been
developed and implemented.
The biologists have picked at random three sites to capture and
band geese this season: Steele Creek Lake, Indian Mountain
State Park in Campbell County near Tennessee's northern border
and Henderson Island on Cherokee Lake.
The crew felt they were off to a good start on their season goal
to capture and band 300 Canada Geese during the summer.
In order to have an early September goose season, TWRA has
to prove that they have a significant enough population of the
Giant Canada Geese which are also known as resident geese
as opposed to the northern and Canadian population which
migrates into and thru Tennessee during the winter months.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service wants to be sure the state is
not hunting migratory geese.
The definition of resident Canada geese under federal laws are
those that nest within the lower 48 States in the months of March,
April, May, or June, or reside within the lower 48 States and the
District of Columbia in the months of April, May, June, July, or August.
All of the Canada Geese seen in our region during late spring
and summer are resident "Giant Canada Geese".
TWRA's master plan calls for:
1. Continue the spring aerial surveys to provide population estimates
for resident Canada geese at least once every three years.
2. Implement hunting regulations that will focus on maintaining the
population at or below 60,000.
4. Band an appropriately distributed sample of resident geese each
year to assist in determining the survival rate and the distribution and
magnitude of harvest.
5. Develop capability of implementing other methods of resident Canada
goose population control.
6. Continue to work through a memo of understanding with the U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Services.
3. Continue translocation of problem and/or nuisance Giant Canada
Geese (residents) and assess the effectiveness of the translocations.
Giant Canada geese were once thought to be extinct but were rediscovered in
the mid-1960s. Three decades later, populations of "resident" Canada geese
were common sights throughout the eastern United States.
Resident Canada geese move around more than was once thought.
The geese seen standing in the city park today may not be the
same geese you see a month from now. They move around, and in the
wintertime they move more because they are out looking for grass.
Geese banded in Tennessee sometimes make a northern migration
once molting is over and have been found as far away as Canada. The
birds tend to show back up in their home range later in the fall.
The growth of Tennessee's goose population has leveled off and is
estimated to be between 60,000 and 70,000 birds, most of which are
in Middle and East Tennessee.
The population objective for giant Canada geese in the Mississippi
Flyway, which includes all of Tennessee, is to maintain a population
of approximately one million geese as measured by coordinated spring
surveys, with the population distributed in proportion to state and
provincial objectives.
Let's go birding....
Wallace Coffey
Bristol, TN
Other related posts:
- » [Bristol-Birds] State kicks off goose banding in Bristol Tennessee
