‘Tornado of white birds.’ Over 2 million geese make pit stop in Missouri, photos show

What do 2 million geese sound like?

Four million wings flapping, 2 million beaks honking — it’s something beyond description, officials at the Loess Bluffs National Wildlife Refuge say.

“The noise is awe-inspiring and something that you will hear in your dreams,” the refuge told McClatchy News in an email.

Whether those would be pleasant dreams or nightmares, the refuge didn’t specify.

These particular geese, snow geese, are known for being especially loud, according to experts.

“Snow geese are vocal on the ground, on the water and in the air. Their repetitive, single honking call would give a flock of tundra swan stiff competition for noisiest waterfowl,” the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service says.

Snow geese have been swarming into the 7,500-acre Missouri refuge in recent weeks, photos shared on the refuge’s Facebook show.

Photos capture the birds taking off together in dense flocks and covering the refuge’s wetlands like way too many kids in a wave pool.

“During the peak of their arrival the blue wetland is turned into a sea of white,” the refuge said. Besides being a breathtaking sight, it’s a hard-to-miss sign that winter is slowly giving way to spring.

“The refuge is a mecca for large concentrations of migratory birds during the spring and fall,” the refuge said, but the arrival of the snow geese is “by far, the most spectacular.”

It’s a temporary home as they make their way back north toward the Arctic Circle, according to the refuge, but the relatively brief pit stop leaves a lasting impression on the visitors fortunate enough to witness it.

“It is truly hard to capture this experience in words, or even photos,” the refuge said. “Watching a tornado of white birds take off and land in the wetlands is a spectacle.”

This story was originally published February 27, 2023 at 1:02 PM with the headline "‘Tornado of white birds.’ Over 2 million geese make pit stop in Missouri, photos show."