Brent Goose population studies, 1961-62

Abstract

Counts of the proportion of young in wintering flocks of Brent Geese were made in the British Isles, Denmark, Holland and France and showed that a bad breeding season for Dark-bellied Brent had coincided with an even worse one for Greenland-bred Pale-bellied birds wintering in Ireland. The result must have been a reduction in the total population of Brent and limited evidence suggests that this might have been of the order of about 9% for a large part of the Dark-bellied population. Observations made on the island of Terschelling suggest a differential movement of birds with families and those without.