By Jacob Wightman for SPLIT REED
Many hunters up and down the Mississippi Flyway have started to notice an increased number of double-banded Canada geese. This is due to the rivet band retention project. This specific leg band is a part of the retention project, studying aluminum versus stainless steel bands. The rivet band is used as a control; the project is being conducted to study the longevity comparison between the aluminum band and the stainless steel band.
Photos courtesy of Trevor Stykalo
The research project is being led by Frank Baldwin, head biologist out of Winnipeg, Manitoba. He was given 10,000 bands to place on Canada Geese over time. This banding study started in 2011 and is to be finished up at the end of the banding season in 2020. There are around 1000 bands left to be placed on birds in the study. Being said, that puts around 9000 rivet banded birds active or deceased in the Mississippi Flyway today.
Frank has already noticed that the stainless steel bands have a higher retention rate but is finding that there are still kinks to be worked out. The rivet band has a 100% retention rate. The noted downside is that they are much more time consuming to place on birds. He was unsure of whether the rivet band or the stainless steel band will be the new go-to for single banded geese in the future. An interesting fact is that there is a higher loss of bands on Male, Giant Canada Geese.
All data is collected on recaptured geese, not from shot and killed geese. These geese are considered (temperate nesting) Canada geese. These are the Giant Canada geese that nest south of the N 53rd latitude parallel. Canadian geese that nest north of that parallel are considered subarctic nesters.
Photos courtesy of Austin Kaufman
My hope for the reader of this article is to clear up some questions on the Rivet Band Retention Project. A big thank you goes out to Frank and his team for their hard work and efforts on the study of these birds. Hunters keep reporting your bands! Without your reports of banded birds, these banding projects and studies are not feasible. Thanks for everybody’s time and attention to Split Reed and refer back for more informational articles in the future.
Photo Courtesy of Cory Loeffler
