Family Life of Canada's Water-Fowl

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 8, 2 October 1937, Page 16

Family Life of Canada's Water-Fowl

EDMONTON. Information on the family life and nesting habits of t'he water-fowl which wing their flight each spring to nesting grounds in the Maclcenzie river delta, the western Arctic and Coronation Gulf will be the quest undertaken this summer by C. E. Gillham, associate biologist of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Travelling by 'plane from Edmontoh to the Far North, Mr. Gillham will study the habits of the nesting birds in the Fort Chipewyan and Lake Athabasca areas. His next llight . will take him to Aklavik and the Mackenzie delta, where he says the largest population of snow geese Jn tho world mako their home.

t(lheso birds derive their namo from the fact that when they nest on Richards Island in the summer time, .their numbers are so great that. they are sometimes mistaken for banks of suow. . That the Eskimos are close students oi tho habits of the nesting water-fowl was stated by Mr. Gillham, who plans to sojourn for a time at Coronation Gulf where he hopes to obtaiu valuable information from the Eskimo hunters to aid him in his investigations. The conservation of game birds is the chief aim of the department for wlxieh Mr. Gillham is making this expedition to Canada 's hinterland. Tho information and deductions from this survey will aid greatly -in the drawing-up of regulations for the international treaties being maintained co-operately by-- the Governments of the TJnited S'tates, Mexico and Ganada. It is estimated that of the total population of water-fowl on this continent, approxima'tely 90 per cent. xaise their families in Canada, the western Arclic and Mackenzie delta being chosen by the majority of the waterfowl as their 'nesting grounds.