# Hybrid????



## Greg_4242 (Feb 21, 2005)

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When we shot 38 one day in Nd we got aboud a dozen snows with the shorter bill. There is no way we shot a dozen hybrids in one jump!!


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## Commando (Jan 13, 2006)

Sure they weren't Ross?


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## Travery (Mar 15, 2005)

Sounds like some Ross Geese


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## GooseBuster3 (Mar 1, 2002)

They were ross.


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## Greg_4242 (Feb 21, 2005)

You have to be stupid to mix a ross with a snow. I shot over 60 light geese last spring. In MN most of the birds we get are juviniles and Rossies. I know what they look like and these weren't ross geese. They where the same size as the larger Snows. The only diff. was the length of the beak.


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## cranebuster (Nov 2, 2004)

The best way to tell snow from ross is the grin patch, the middle one had a grin patch so it was a snow, must have just been a small one, ross won't have a grin patch.


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## rc1hunter (Oct 26, 2003)

I think you have some sort of hybrid. We got into a bunch of cross type snows late in the season in Missouri. 
We got all three sizes like you did. We did get a blue ross/cross that was the size of a ross but did have a small grin patch and a blue but also got tiny blues and snows in full plumage that were not lessers and were not ross geese. Had all three sizes to compare each like you did also.
I think it is getting more and more common.
My biologist confirmed our blue ross but said it had some lesser in him from some generation back. 
Cool to see the cross breeds.

rc1


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## Greg_4242 (Feb 21, 2005)

The snows with the small bills has a grin patch but it wasn't as pernounced. Is there a difference between Greaters and Lesser Snows bills. I just find it hard to believe we pounded a flock that had a high % of hybrids in it.


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## Snow Hunter (Nov 16, 2004)

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I think that it would be entirely possible to shoot that many hybrids in one jump. The middle sized snows look like they have some ross in them. The thing is female snow geese are very philopatric ( meaning they return to the same breeding grounds every year). Now suppose a few years ago you had a ross and a lesser snow breed and produce offspring. They then return to the breeding grounds 2 or 3 years later with their mates and have offspring... I am sure you can see where I am going. The result after a few generations could be a small colony of smaller snows with some ross mixed in that would look like the middle goose in your pictures. Pretty cool stuff.


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## Greg_4242 (Feb 21, 2005)

O.k. I suppose that would work. But, you have to realize that most hybrid animals, tiger muskies, mules, beefalos, saugeyes, and so on, can't breed. They are not fertile animals. Is it the same with Duck species or are they close enough on the phylogenic tree that they can continue to breed like dogs.


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## GooseBuster3 (Mar 1, 2002)

Well there dead arent they? Thats all that matter's. :wink:


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## salacia (Jun 26, 2005)

I'm no genetics expert but I'd liken it to a chinese woman mating with an african man. They don't look much alike. She's a lot smaller, has a smaller nose, etc. but their babies certainly would be fertile.

I'd bet a ross goose genetically is close enough to a snow to work. We've seen snow/speck crosses - which we assumed could breed again. I have a hard time believing a snow/ross wouldn't work and couldn't breed.

I would think that at some stage, if the hybrids breed with more lessers, the ross goose genes would ultimately begin to get diluted into the lesser snow genes. In that there are more lesser snows than ross geese - just using statistics.

Just like I understand there are breeding preferences which are causing blue geese to multiply more and more.. and I hear of more and more blue phase ross geese now too than I did ten years ago.... or maybe that's just thanks to the internet.


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## cranebuster (Nov 2, 2004)

You would think that there would have to be one blue-ross cross for every snow-ross cross. The latter of which are extremely rare and are most often, from what i've heard, sterile. They are closely related enough to breed, but are different species, like a mule deer whitetail cross, not like a canadian whitetail with a texas whitetail. It's a pretty darn complex thing they have going on, I did a presentation for an ornithology class on blues and snows and there's so much variation among them its amazing. There's actually 3 different phases of snow geese, based upon the varying degree of darkness on their wings. Part of what makes hunting them so much fun, each one is different, it's not like shooting a canada that looks just like another damn canada.


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