Seventy-two years ago today, northeast Oregon’s first record of the sweet little Ross goose was obtained when I.S. Surber shot a juvenile in Wallowa County. Reporting on the remarkable find, Stanley Jewel noted that
recent known occurrences of the Ross Goose outside of its regular winter range have been few and far between and should be placed on record.
Fast forward three quarters of a century: How many counties in the United States have not recorded the species?
How things change — and sometimes for the better, at least from the point of view of certain tiny white geese.
(The photo is from central New Jersey — ho hum, almost.)
