Taiga Bean Goose and Tundra Bean Goose

The taiga bean goose was once the hallmark species of the Old Lake, making it an internationally significant site. Until the early 2000’s, thousands of these birds wintered here, but today only a few hundred can be observed.

This species has a wide Palearctic distribution and is a polytypic species. Its breeding range extends from Iceland, Svalbard and Scandinavia to eastern Siberia. Five subspecies have been described. Since 2019, Hungarian records distinguish between the taiga bean goose and the tundra bean goose. Earlier data classified all bean goose sightings as taiga bean goose, but the tundra bean goose is also present in Hungary, albeit less frequently.

The decline of the taiga bean goose in the Pannonian region has been significant. Until the late 1990s, it was the dominant species in the county, making up 85-95% of the wintering geese. However, its numbers have steadily decreased, dropping below 10,000 by 2007. In recent years, only a handful of individuals have wintered at the Tata Lakes Ramsar Site.

Ornithologists sought to understand the dramatic decline of this species at its traditional wintering grounds. Research revealed that the birds no longer migrate as far as the Carpathian Basin but instead stop in Germany and Poland, likely due to climate change altering their wintering range.

In Hungary, it is a Natura 2000 species and can be hunted in Komárom-Esztergom County from October to January with daily bag limits.

Illustration: Szabolcs Kókay – BirdLife Hungary– www.mme.hu