Mystery solved, with help from a New Jersey 101.5 listener

For those of you who might be wondering what those huge flocks of big, white birds flying around our state right now are...they're snow geese.

They were hunted into near extinction in the early part of the last century, and after a ban on their killing, they're back in large numbers. They nest in the arctic tundra of Canada and Greenland and they winter in places like New Jersey. These paler cousins of the Canada goose are flocking by the tens of thousands near bays, rivers and reservoirs in a few counties both near the southern coast and the Delaware River.

I got curious last week on the air and one of our listeners clued me in on what they were.  After some research I've found out that they're becoming a more common site in New Jersey with each passing mild winter. If you love nature like I do, they're a curious but beautiful site to behold.

I had to pull over the other day and try to capture them in a picture because it just looked so unusual to see hundreds of them take over a farm field in Burlington County. The pictures can't do it justice, as with most of natures' special moments. Enjoy them for the next month or so, before they head back up to the great white north!

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