story courtesy National Elk Refuge; photos by Mark Gocke, WGFD

The Jackson Hole and Greater Yellowstone Visitor Center was a flurry of activity earlier this month when Wyoming Game and Fish Department personnel banded 42 geese on the center's lawn, a project that specifically targeted members of the Rocky Mountain population of Western Canada geese. The visitor center is located on the National Elk Refuge, adjoining Flat Creek where Canada geese are frequently seen.

The Rocky Mountain population includes birds that breed in Alberta, western Montana, eastern Idaho, central and western Wyoming, eastern Nevada, Utah, western Colorado, and Arizona. Each of these states has a goose banding program. Though this segment of geese primarily winter in Arizona, California, Colorado, and New Mexico, some birds stay all winter in the northern states in areas that do not freeze up. Counts have documented only 500 geese in western Wyoming during the winter but as many as 10,000 during summer and early fall.

The bird banding project will help officials determine movements between breeding, wintering, and molting areas and evaluate changes in goose distribution. The information will be used to document spring and fall staging areas and predict how shifts in changing wintering areas may affect harvest patterns. It will also serve as a tool to note if harvest rates in the survey areas are too high or low based on the population status.

In addition to the banding, wildlife managers collected samples from 15 adult geese to test for the presence of avian influenza. The Department is participating in a national surveillance program for the disease in order to monitor the types of influenza found in North American and attempt to detect the highly pathogenic avian influenza strain currently affecting Asia and Europe. The surveillance compliments monitoring done by the National Elk Refuge's biologist who also watches for the presence of avian influenza. Waterfowl are regularly observed, and any sick or dead birds will be collected and sent to a federal lab for disease testing.