Goose Bay and Palmer Hay Flats: when each site’s manager says snow geese are there and directions to each.
The months are each site manager’s own, quoted and linked below with the day they were read.
Over twenty thousand geese stop to rest and feed in the refuge in the spring (mid-April to mid-May). Canada geese are most numerous, with several thousand snow geese and an occasional white-fronted goose sighted as well.Alaska Department of Fish and Game, read October 13, 2026. Read it at the source
Three species of geese also heavily utilize the Hay Flats during migration—the lesser Canada, greater white-fronted (including the tule subspecies), and snow goose.Alaska Department of Fish and Game, read October 13, 2026. Read it at the source
A pin takes a color only in the months the refuge or agency that runs it gives for snow geese. The shaded grid is where people have logged a verified snow or Ross’s goose on iNaturalist in October, in any year, brighter where more have been logged; it maps reports, so it thickens where observers stand.
Due back in AprilAlaska, October
Snow geese are due back at Goose Bay in April.
Over twenty thousand geese stop to rest and feed in the refuge in the spring (mid-April to mid-May). Canada geese are most numerous, with several thousand snow geese and an occasional white-fronted goose sighted as well.Alaska Department of Fish and Game, read October 13, 2026. Read it at the source
Other geese migrating through the Mendenhall Refuge in spring include the cackling Canada goose, lesser Canada goose, white-fronted goose, and snow goose.Alaska Department of Fish and Game, read October 13, 2026. Read it at the source
More reports come in April than in any other month. The bars combine every year on record; the twelve month figure runs from October 14, 2025.
21 research grade snow and Ross’s goose reports from Alaska in the twelve months to October 14, 2026.
Reading this month’s reports from iNaturalist.
Every fact about Alaska’s snow geese links to the refuge, agency or festival page it comes from, read on October 13, 2026. Tour routes and viewing areas close for weather, hunts and work, so check the site’s own page before you drive. Report tallies are iNaturalist research grade records of snow and Ross’s geese, which count sightings, not birds. Every state is on the snow goose migration hub.