Human Disturbances to Waterfowl
Annotated Bibliography
The fear of dogs was amply demonstrated at Boas River in 1953 when "waves" of snow geese ran wildly across the tundra pursued by a stray dog. The reaction of snow geese toward intrusion by man is variable, but seems density dependent. Development of tameness was noticed at Boas River, where the same route was followed each day and nests were always approached from the same direction. If the direction of approach was changed a completely different reaction was seen. In the first case, the birds would move away when the investigator was within 6.1 m of the nest, while in the second case birds moved at more than 45.7 m. Females followed a definite ritual when returning to the nest, after turning eggs; or when disturbed by predators or low-flying aircraft. When dense colonies suddenly became reduced to a few scattered incubating pairs, remaining females frequently deserted nests taking only dry young. When geese were disturbed by humans when one gosling was strong enough to follow, the rest of the brood was left to its fate.
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