Gould observed 'Few sights are more attractive...than a "skein" of wild geese passing through the air - a string of wandering birds which have quitted some far-off locality, and are journeying to a haven better suited to their requirements....During the winter the Barnacle Goose is a common bird in the British Islands....it arrives in September and October... and departs to the more northly regions early in the spring, few or none remaining after the middle of March.'

DISTRIBUTION: Breeds northern Palaearctic in east Greenland, the Svalbard archipelago and the islands of Novaya Zemlya and Vaigach in arctic Russia. Winters south to British Isles, and northwest Europe