"My geese, geese ..."

Kologriv, a small district center in the north of the Kostroma region, most of the year lives slowly - to the railway and a large route seventy kilometers of direction, which during several trips kills the suspension of any SUV. On the May holidays, however, there is a revival, which is not even the second of Russian troubles: wild geese fly into the floodplain of the river.

In the mid-1980s, birds chose this place for an intermediate stop along the way from wintering places in Holland to nests in the tundra of the European part of Russia. Look at them not only from nearby cities. In the city there are cars with numbers of Moscow, Peter and other Russian regions, up to Kaluga, Penza and the Tyumen region. The city administration on this occasion since 2005 has been organizing the day of the Goose in early May - a local holiday under the motto "Kologriv - the Goose capital of Russia." The matter is not limited to the fair trade and the self-activity concert: on the bridge over the Unjuy, from where the geese are best visible, ornithologists of the working group in the goose-like (RSG), studying the migration of white-faced geese in the European part of Russia, equip the site for observation. From it, everyone can look at the birds in powerful binoculars and visual pipes. This year, nonitologists added photographers-nastalists-Andrian Kolotilin, Alexei Volkov, Mikhail Timofeev and Andrei Parshakov performed with small presentations, so it turned out to be a small ecotherapy. Such meetings bring good fruits: local residents do not disturb the geese themselves and make sure that the visitors do not do this.

Specialists from the Institute of Geography of the Russian Academy of Sciences and IPE them. Severtsova RAS has been working in a Kologriva every spring for seven years. Despite the terrible roads, this place is much more affordable and more comfortable than the subpolar. Here, these very cautious and shy birds (coupled with two other dozen other species) can be observed from a very small distance, literally without leaving the car (the geese are not afraid of cars on the road, but the person on the side of the road already makes them move away). However, to photograph them closely, an expensive long -focus optics is still required and very, very much patience, and the best time to observe it immediately after dawn.

Initially, the work on white -faced geese were financed by the Dutch as part of the joint project of Spring (2008–11). Later, RFFF was connected to the case, now the group works mainly at the means of its institutions and grant of the Russian Geographical Society. Due to the events in Ukraine and sanctions, Europeans did not come to Kologriv this year, but, according to the head of the group of Peter Glazov (IG RAS), there is still small support from the Dutch-analytical materials and test complexes to determine various diseases among birds.

On the spot, the ornithologists are helped by the employees of the Kologrivsky Forest State Reserve, founded in 2006 to preserve the last untouched section of the Reliktova European Taiga (there has not been a single cutting and not a single forest fire on the territory of the reserve). The UNZHI’s floodplain and the adjacent fields from mid -April to the end of May become a specially protected reserve so that the birds can be relatively calmly gaining strength, and scientists and photographers can get unique material.

Of course, the matter is not limited by simple observation and calculation - oats are scattered across the feeding field, scrubs are arranged for observation and filming, there is even a wooden observation tower. The special pride of ornithologists of the RSG is a trap of a unique structure, carefully disguised from geese and people, which allows (unless, of course, the geese come to it) instantly and without injuries to catch birds for ringing and taking samples. The Dutch farmers have been used by such a device for the Dutch farmers for catching geese on wintering since the end of the 19th century. Today, however, geese caught in the Poems do not eat, but ring with scientific purposes.

The author expresses gratitude to Andrian Kolotilin and the Federal State Budgetary Institution “GO SUDAL SPECIAL “ KOLARIVSKY FOREST ” .

Photo by the author