60 FAMILY

Habitat.--A variety of habitats near water, from temperateregions to tundra; winters from tidewater areas and marshes to wooded inland lakes and flooded and cultivated fields, increasinglyin areaswith large lawns in urban areas,such as parks and golf courses. Distribution.--Breeds from the Arctic coast of Alaska and northern Canada east to south- ern Baffin Island, western Greenland, and Labrador, and south to the Commander Islands (formerly), Aleutians (Buldir), central and northeasternCalifornia, central Utah, southern New Mexico, northernTexas, Arkansas,western Tennessee, western Kentucky, Ohio, New York, and Virginia. Winters from south-coastaland southeasternAlaska (west to Prince William Sound), British Columbia, southern Alberta, southern Saskatchewan, southern Manitoba, the Great Lakes region and Atlantic coast of Newfoundland south to central Baja California, the northernMexican states(casually south to Jaliscoand Veracruz), Texas, and southwestern Louisiana,and to (rare) Mississippi,Alabama, and northernFlorida (casuallyto the Florida Keys), formerly also to Kamchatkaand Japan. Introduced and established in Iceland, the British Isles, Sardinia, and New Zealand; in addition, there are many fetal, usually nonmigratory(although free-flying) populationsin the United States,both within and outsidethe normal breedingrange, and often of a sub- speciesother than that expectedin the wild. Casual north to Melville Island, and in the Hawaiian Islands,central Siberia, and Japan. Accidental in Bermuda, the Bahamas (Andros, New Providence, Eleuthera), Cuba, and the DominicanRepublic; there are recordsin Jamaicaand PuertoRico of of questionable origin. Notes.--The northernpopulations of small CanadaGeese have been variouslytreated taxonomicallyas three separatespecies, B. hutchinsii(Richardson, 1832) [Hutchins'sor Richardson'sGoose], B. rninirna Ridgway, 1885 [Cackling ], and B. leucopareia (Brandt, 1836) [Aleutian Goose]; as a single speciesunder the name B. hutchinsii;or as one or more subspeciesof B. canadensis.Relationships between breeding populations and groupsare still uncertain,but this complexprobably consists of at leasttwo ,a large one, B. canadensis [], and a small one, B. hutchinsii [Tundra Goose], that includes the other two groups (Aldrich 1946, supportedby mtDNA data in Quinn et al. 1991).

Branta sandvicensis(Vigors). Hawaiian Goose. Bernicla sandvicensisVigors, 1834, Proc. Zool. Soc. London, p. 43 (Olson, 1989, Bull. Brit. Ornithol. Club 109: 201-205). (in insulisSandvicensibus et in Owyhee = island of .) Habitat.--Uplands, primarily sparselyvegetated lava flows with no standingwater. Distribution.--Resident in the Hawaiian Islandson Hawaii (populationsmall andlocally distributed,the surviving native populationshaving been increasedby introductionsfrom captive stock);recently introducedin the Haleakala area of , where it may formerly have bred, and on . Notes.--Formerly placedin the monotypicgenus Nesochen. Quinn et al. (1991) indicated that this speciesis closelyrelated to B. canadensis.Also known as Nene.

Branta bernicla (Linnaeus). Brant. AnasBernicla Linnaeus,1758, Syst.Nat. (ed. 10)1: 124. (in Europaboreali = Sweden.) Habitat.--Arctic tundra,near coastand often in river deltas;winters primarily in coastal marshes,lagoons, estuaries, and shallowbays. Distribution.--Breeds [bernicla group] in North America from Prince Patrick, Melville, and Ellesmere islands south to northern Keewatin (Adelaide Peninsula), Prince of Wales Island (probably),and Southampton,Coats, and westernBaffin islands,and in the Palearctic in northernGreenland, Spitsbergen, and Franz JosefLand eastto the Taimyr Peninsula;and [nigricansgroup] in North America from western(Kuskokwim Bay) and northernAlaska east to northernMackenzie and Banks, Melville, and Prince Patrick islands (probably also Victoria Island), and in the Palearcticalong the coastof Siberiaeast of the Taimyr Peninsula to the Bering Strait, WrangellIsland, and the ChukotskiPeninsula.