Greylag Goose Anser anser

Here in Norfolk Greylag Goose is chiefly known as a feral species but wild birds from northern populations do winter here in small numbers. Icelandic birds sometimes crop up among Pink-footed Goose flocks and neck-collared birds from Orkney have also wintered here. Domesticated Greylag Geese, including those in the wild with some domestic ancestry, are dealt with separately here - only birds that do not show any sign of domestic ancestry are dealt with on this page.

Greylag Geese, Strumpshaw Fen (Norfolk, UK), 4th April 2009

Typically Greylag Geese have pink legs but among feral populations at least, orange-legged birds are very common.

Greylag Geese, Swanton Morley (Norfolk, UK), 1st April 2012

Greylag Geese, Creaking Gate Lake, Bittering (Norfolk, UK), 6th April 2013

Icelandic birds among Pink-footed Geese look much smaller than the local feral birds - barely any bigger than the Pink-footed Geese.

Icelandic Greylag Goose (with Pink-footed Geese), between Amner and Shernborne (Norfolk, UK), 17th January 2011

Birds with pink bills occasionally turn up in western Europe and these are sometimes mooted as the eastern race rubirostris. However, there is a broad zone of intergradation and it is likely that these birds come from much less far east than the core range of rubirostris. This bird with a Swedish neck collar is one such example (this bird was seen flying past Porthgwarra on 9th October before arriving on the Hayle estuary the following day):

Greylag Goose, Hayle (Cornwall, UK), 21st October 2010

These pink-billed birds were much further east, but I gather that even in the Arabian peninsular birds over-wintering are not believed to have come from within the range of pure rubirostris:

two Greylag Geese, Hilf (Masirah, Oman), 21st October 2010

Greylag Goose gosling, Wroxham Broad (Norfolk, UK), 11th May 2009