[mou] Small Canada Goose

[Carl Greiner]

Hi Blaine and others,
	Is this the bird that has been at Silver Lake in Rochester all winter? I
have assumed it is Richardson's (see Sibley) mostly based on size and range
but also due to the subjective "lightness" of the breast and the
short-stubby bill. I took some pics also but have not had them developed
yet. It tweaked my interest because it is clearly extremely different from
the others. However, I haven't found the time to adequately research the
issue. From what I have been able to glean from the literature so far is
that there is a large amount of controversy about C. Goose subspecies with
some groups claiming they be separated into different species (small,
regular, giant, etc..) and others accepting varying numbers of subspecies
ranging from 0 (AOU) to 6 (Sibley) to more than 100 subspecies and multiple
species (H.C. Hanson).
	The scientific literature has likewise been less than definative. Some
findings indicate that perceived morphological differences were not accurate
in differentiating subspecies (sorry I don't have the reference handy -
study done in AK and CA). Whereas a recent article (Paxinos et al, 2002
PNAS) appeared to confirm a earlier morphological and molecular study that
"large" and "small" C.Goose subspecies are divergent enough to warrant
separate species designation. My personal opinion is still being formulated.
A good place to start is:
http://www.oceanwanderers.com/CAGO.Subspecies.html

Carl Greiner
cgreiner@millcomm.com