DUCK GOOSE

In short, the Egyptian Geese looked entirely at home. This is at odds to most people’s opinion concerning the species in the UK. Ask almost any birder you meet and the Egyptian Goose’s presence is considered to be incongruous. It isn’t a “good fit”. We are generally very sniffy about it, to the point where most birders more or less ignore it. The vast majority of people view the Egyptian Goose as something of a new kid on the block. It was only accepted on to the official British List in the 1970s, by virtue of a selfsustaining population in East Anglia. In the 1990s, the population was estimated at about 400 birds. Only in the most recent decades has it shown any appetite for spread. The fact is, though, that the Egyptian Goose has been around for considerably longer than you might imagine. The first reference to it in Britain dates from as far back as 1678, during the debauchery and excess of the reign of Charles II. This is not long after the English Civil War. The bird was introduced into the King’s own collection and, as was customary at the time, it became a fashion accessory among the noblemen and thus was released into many parts of the country, including Devon and East Lothian, as well as

Norfolk. The feet of Egyptian Geese, in other words, have trod the fields of Britain every day in the last 330 or so years. Almost from the off they began to form free-flying flocks, too, so the birds have been flying in our airspace for almost as long – and for longer than mankind has. Thus, Egyptian Geese in Britain pre-date such introduced staples as the Grey Squirrel and of course, recent self-colonists such as Collared Doves. If they were buildings, they would probably be listed – so why aren’t they as birds? The relative lack of interest in this species is particularly surprising given that it is beginning to thrive here as never before. Back in 1990 the population of the Egyptian Goose “seemed to have changed little over the last one and a half centuries,” according to a survey, and although there were hints that it was expanding slowly, few would have predicted its meteoric increase since then. Within a few years, it broke out of East Anglia and colonised large swathes of the London area; it is now a regular sight in the East Midlands and the south. The expansion has not been fully documented yet, but the East Anglian population had reached a maximum of 900 breeding pairs by 2007 and we could perhaps double or triple that to Looking more like a Shelduck than a true goose, the Egyptian Goose is a curious bird