Crowded Northern California Beach
Note: One local say these folks aren’t tourists but live here year round. (Let that be a lesson in making assumptions about who is local or who isn’t based on species!)
According to the Northcoast Marine Mammal Center and the Humboldt Wildlife Care Center, these are Canadian geese as Aleutian Geese don’t breed around here. We understand from them that though they have their babies here in the spring very few stick around all year.
Robert Merrick from the Humboldt Wildlife Care Center told us,
Each year multiple Canada Goose families choose the stretch of beach from College Cove to Moonstone to raise their families… in most years, dogs, people etc wreak havoc on the goose families, and sometimes we have to go re-unite a gosling or two with their parents. Still its perfectly withing the laws of nature for them to nest there, even though I personally wish they’d choose someplace safer. To clarify on species, Aleutian Cackling Geese only winter here. Many Canada Geese also winter here , and surely some are year-round residents, and some winter elsewhere and only come to our region for nesting season…I havent seen any Aleutians in our area in over a week… the latest Ive seen them here is May 5… we have a Cackling goose in care right now, who has been with us since April 13 and will be forced to Summer in Humboldt since her gang has already split the scene…
(Note: an earlier version of this post said they might be Aleutian Cackling geese but we now know they aren’t.)
For more cool photos, follow Photog_Mark on Instagram.
Join the discussion! For rules visit: https://kymkemp.com/commenting-rules
Comments system how-to: https://wpdiscuz.com/community/postid/10599/
🤣😂🤣😂🤣
Well done, well done.
Honkers & Fluff Balls what a great sight!!!
Thank You.
My kind of crowd!
Good one. Thanks Kym.
Love Humboldt 💜💜💜
They’re Canadians.
Homeschooling field trip.
They aren’t worried about catching the corona virus.
They have diplomatic immunity.
Sorry, those are western Canada geese, not Aleutian Cackling geese. They are called Aleutian because they nest on the Aleutian Islands. Also western Canada geese are much larger and don’t have the white ring around the neck.
Too bad that they are local. I was going to give them a break for unsafe social distancing because they are foreigners. Being locals, they should know better…shame, shame!
A single family unit doesn’t require the same sort of distancing as individuals visiting separately. They live together, travel together.
I was slightly disturbed that they didn’t wear masks…
Good point.
Mom and Dad should be wearing masks but the children appear to be under two years of age so technically they’re ok.
😷
Please be sure to show us the crowds on local beaches now that the sheriff has undermined shelter in place protocols. I suspect we will see a flood of people. Btw we have seen people failing to follow social distancing protocols on our beaches. Of course Luffenholtz is normally pretty empty though.
We couldn’t have one light-hearted thread featuring the local beauty and wildlife??
hmm, contact Sheriff Honsal via his email and tell him how you feel regarding open beaches. You can find his email in the Humboldt County website.
When Sheriff Billy actually protects the beaches against bonfires, dogs, horses, goons on 4×4’s and other destructive nuisances, I will agree with him.
That reminds me, bonfire at the beach is a great idea! We could all have fires 6 feet apart! If someone wants to get a little domestic with me we can skip the six feet!
Well that got weird fast. Not really sure where you stand on beach freedoms.
What awesome photos. Great job!
We have a pair on the Eel River in SoHum. Also a pair of Mallards… Both aren’t the usual, but beautiful .
We are Canada Geese. Aleutian Cackling Geese raise their families in the Aleutian Islands.
We are following social distancing guidelines by sheltering in place in our home. We have raised our family of goslings on Luffenholtz beach for several years now. It’s a great place as long as humans and dogs don’t chase us.
Please help protect us and other wildlife by keeping your dogs leashed while on beaches and giving us plenty of space!
If you see an injured or orphaned wild animal call Humboldt Wildlife Care Center 707 822 8839. Or for marine mammals call Northcoast Marine Mammal Center 707 951 4722
Thanks for the info. And definitely support the Humboldt Wildlife Care Center, folks. They do great work.
If you can see another human on one of our beaches, it is crowded.
If these geese think they are somehow immune from the bilirubin, they are obviously harboring Aleutians of gander.😁
Yes, they are definitely daleutianal.
HEY! Those are my birds! Moved to Canada after nearly 40 years in Eureka. Most take off, and some stay here. I think they need to come home if the border opens. 😁
The geese drink Corona which makes them virus proof so they can gather in groups closer than six feet.
I went to one of our local beaches on Sunday. Seeing families and people with their dogs playing in the water was very comforting to me. I talked to a few of the people while our dogs played. Everyone was pretty much following the social distance. I don’t understand why people are upset with this. Don’t you want to get back to normality? It was probably the best thing everyone did for their wellbeing.
Yes- getting to normal is what everyone wants, but wishful thinking doesn’t cut it to prevent ongoing outbreaks following us into the fall, racking up the body count into a highly likely second wave in the fall. Avoiding this end is success at this point.
I don’t know what you witnessed or participated in at the beach, and perhaps “pretty much following the social distance” may well have been sufficient to protect everyone from spreading the disease. In fact, we WILL all adapt and learn new ways of doing things until a vaccine &/or reliable therapeutics are available.
My point is that “getting back to normal” is the wrong goal at this stage!
The right goal for now should be getting as many of our people through this crisis as possible while meeting the fundamental needs of we the people.
It’s an order of operations issue!
Great pictures…great story! Thanks 🙂