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Pink-footed Goose

Pink-footed Goose

Anser brachyrhynchus

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The Pink-footed Goose is a medium-sized Arctic goose with a short, pink-banded bill and pink feet. It breeds in eastern Greenland, Iceland and Svalbard, and recently also on Novaya Zemlya, and winters in north-western Europe. Highly social and noisy, it travels and feeds in large flocks, often forming spectacular skeins in the sky. Protection on the wintering grounds has helped its numbers grow markedly in recent decades.

Did you know?

  • Its scientific name, brachyrhynchus, means “short-billed”.
  • A new breeding population on Novaya Zemlya is one of the most dramatic climate-driven range shifts documented in a migratory bird.

Voice

Sound

About the species

Identification

A compact, grey-brown goose with a dark brown head and neck, pink legs and a short dark bill with a pink band; the upperwing is bluish grey. It is smaller than Greylag, with pink legs and a much shorter bill; compared with Bean Goose it has a shorter bill with pink (not orange) markings and pink legs; unlike White-fronted Goose it lacks a white blaze and black belly bars.

Family

Anatidae

Size

Very large (swan)

Colours

brown, grey, white

About the habitat

Breeds on Arctic tundra, rocky slopes and river gorges near fresh water. In winter it favours lowland farmland, pastures and stubble fields, with lakes, estuaries or mudflats nearby for roosting.

Diet

Almost entirely plant matter. In summer it eats tundra plants; in winter it grazes grasses and crops such as cereals, oilseed rape, sugar beet and potatoes, often gleaning harvest leftovers.

Behaviour

Strongly migratory and very gregarious, forming large vocal skeins and big feeding flocks that commute between safe roosts and fields. Pairs are long-term and families migrate together. It often nests on cliff ledges near glaciers or on islets to avoid predators; the parents lead the goslings to nearby lakes soon after hatching. The call is a high-pitched “wink-wink”.

Sources

Photo: MPF, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:2019-03-25 Anser brachyrhynchus, Killingworth Lake, Northumberland 1.jpg

Sound: Vulcano, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Oca_de_bec_curt.ogg

Text: Wikipedia (English) + FinBIF species descriptions, CC BY-SA 4.0; FinBIF: CC BY 4.0 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pink-footed_goose

See also