Bar-Headed Goose

Bar-Headed Geese (Anser Indicus) derive their name from the two prominent horse-shoe-shaped, brownish-black bars enhancing the white head. A slightly greater wing area for their weight than other geese enables them to migrate at exceptionably high altitudes over the Himalayas. Most winter foraging areas are currently under cultivation therefore the crepuscular and even nocturnal geese have become reliant on wheat, barley and rice stubble, and they can inflict considerable damage to growing shoots of cereal crops. Bar-Headed Geese (Anser Indicus) are highly gregarious, both on the summering and wintering grounds, they seldom mix with other geese. While shy and wary, especially when hunted in winter, the geese can be reasonably confiding where unmolested and tend to be far more approachable on their breeding haunts. They depart north in March and April, and move up the mountains with the advancing spring thaw, generally arriving on the nesting grounds in early May after lake perimeters are free from ice. Also known as Mountain Geese, they breed up to 16,500 feet on the high plateau of central Asia, with the largest colonies apparently in Tibet, but a number also nest in Kashmir. Small nesting islands may be only several feet above water, and are sometimes flooded. Pairs frequently build up inundated nests, with new eggs laid atop abandoned clutches, though probably by different females. Clutches in the wild average only four eggs, although as many as eight eggs may be laid. Old cliff nests of hawks, falcons and ravens are also utilized, as well a s the tops of broken tree stumps. The geese are inclined to breed in colonies, with dense colonies consisting of thousands of birds. Bar-Headed Goose (Anser Indicus) goslings feed on insect larvae and the leaves of aquatic plants and sedges. Their primary wintering quarters are in the lowland marshes, lakes and rivers on the plains of northern India.