In March of 2005 I was driving home in eastern South Dakota and saw a few thousand snow geese circling a small lake. I had my Nikon F100 and lenses 500mm f4 and 28-80mm f2.8 along. I saw a couple of state FishyGame biologists standing by their truck by the lake so I pulled alongside and got out. Looking through my Nikon binocculars I saw the small lake and surrounding grasslands were completely coated with geese. I asked the biologists how many were in this flock. They replied, \"We think about 90,000 of them are here but a little further north there\'s........\" At that point several gunshots rang out from hunters somewhere nearby. The lake erupted into a white blizzard. The sound from the geese all screaming at once instantly drowned out our voices even when we shouted as loudly as we could. The geese circled the lake like a huge cyclone before settling back down eventually. I took a few shots with my 28-80mm lens and headed on home. I\'ve seen all this many times before.
Every spring birds by the millions return to the Arctic from points further south. The availability of high quality food on the Northern Plains (grain) has fueled a tremendous population explosion among these birds, particularly snow geese. When my kids were younger I would take them out to see the massive flocks, sometimes half a million strong. We\'d crawl out to the edge of the semi-frozen lakes wearing our camo. When we had gone as far as we could go, we\'d jump up and scream, \"BOOGA BOOGA BOOGA!\" as loudly as we could. Instantly tens of thousands if not over 100,000 birds would similtaneously leap into the air, all screaming at the tops of their lungs. My kids & I would then fall on our backs and watch the frantic cloud circling above us, in awe. It\'s truly something to behold. I\'m sure my kids will never forget their \"Adventures With Daddy.\" I have never regretted moving to South Dakota.
Kent in SD
Nov 15, 2009 at 07:28 PM
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