Mystery bird: Greylag goose, Anser anser

Greylag goose, Anser anser, Linnaeus, 1758, also known as the Eastern (or Western!) greylag goose, grey goose, grey lag-goose, or as the greylag, photographed at Redesmere, near Siddington, Cheshire, UK.

Image: Roy Hill (with permission) [velociraptorize].
Canon 5D mkII, Canon 70-200mm EF f/4 L USM, ISO 200, 1/320 second, f/8, focal length 200mm

Here's the original photograph that I showed as the mystery bird two days ago:

Greylag goose, Anser anser, Linnaeus, 1758, photographed at Redesmere, near Siddington, Cheshire, UK. NOTE: this image has been altered. It has been cropped from the original (at top).

Image: Roy Hill (with permission) [velociraptorize to see the complete unaltered image].
Canon 5D mkII, Canon 70-200mm EF f/4 L USM, ISO 200, 1/320 second, f/8, focal length 200mm

Question: This common British mystery bird is so easy to identify that I am only showing you a little portion of it. Can you name the taxonomic family and species? Can you tell me why this mystery bird was given its strange common name?

Response: This is an adult greylag goose, Anser anser. This large bodied Old World goose is the type species for the genus, Anser. It also is the foundation from which the domestic ("barnyard") goose was selectively bred by humans.

This species is notable because they were the subject of a significant proportion of ethologist Konrad Lorenz's research into the behavioural phenomenon of imprinting. Not only are these behavioural researches fascinating in their own right, but this is the only instance in the history of the world where ornithological/zoological research was ever recognised with a Nobel Prize, even though there is plenty more such work that changes how we view the world and ourselves and thus, is equally worthy of this honour. (I'll never understand why there isn't a Nobel Prize for animal behaviour when there is one for the behaviour of über-rich humans. And don't even get me started on that worthless late-comer to the Nobels, the Prize in economics, which I view as "voodoo science"!)

Here's a couple videos about Konrad Lorenz and his wonderful geese:

This second vide lacks sound:

The migratory greylag goose was given its strange common name because its migration lags behind that of other wild geese. (Keep in mind that feral greylag goose populations are primarily resident.)

You are invited to review all of the daily mystery birds by going to their dedicated graphic index page.

If you have bird images, video or mp3 files that you'd like to share with a large and (mostly) appreciative international audience here at The Guardian, feel free to contact me to learn more.

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