On Monday, I toured various parts of the east focusing on the zone north of Hwy 417 from St. Isidore to Casselman, southwest to the Russell/Embrun area and southeast to Moose Creek. I had huge numbers of Canada Geese at sewage lagoons as well as in fields but no Snow Geese. I checked lagoons at St. Isidore, Moose Creek and Embrun but there were none and Route 200 north of Embrun had no birds in fields. At the very end of the day, I had a single flock of a couple of hundred flying high, heading west along Hwy 417 seen from the Hwy 138 exit. However, despite my lack of success, yesterday in the early afternoon, Jon Ruddy reported 12,000 around the Embrun lagoons so the birds are still out there, just playing hard to get. That area has been the most productive this November. The geese are not always present on the lagoons, heading to corn fields in the morning, returning at some point to the water and heading back out sometime in the afternoon to the fields again. As far as migration goes, the primary limiting factor is snow depth. They can stick around in cold weather but they have to be able to feed in the fields. If we had 6-10 inches of snow on the ground we might be out of luck. Cold temperatures will eventually close in lagoons but Embrun has aeration so that should extend the period of open water. Brian Morin