These require that all breeding colonies are banded and their numbers are estimated. These conditions are not currently being met on any breeding colonies. An increase in goose harvest rates is the primary and most important management strategy. We believe that adult survival of snow geese is primarily a function of harvest rate, and that increase HRs will lead to reduced adult survival. Alternatively, increased harvest rates may be compensatory rather than additive.
Adaptive management requires knowledge of the harvest rate-survival relationship.
Banding From the standpoint of demographic analysis of goose populations, sufficient geese should be banded or marked to provide precise survival estimates for young and adult geese of each colony or population. Ideally banding would be conducted annually to generate year-specific recovery and survival rates and information on distribution and derivation or harvest. Because of costs and the long-term nature of the initiative, we therefore propose that Arctic banding should be conducted and coordinated with population surveys, and that monitoring efforts should rotate among sites over a period of three years. In the eastern Arctic, for example, snow geese would be estimated and banded at McConnell River, Southhampton Island and Baffin Island on a three-year rotation. We recommend annual banding and surveys of white geese at Cape Hennrietta Maria and La Perouse Bay.