Tens of thousands of Snow Geese migrate from the summer homes in Alaska, Canada, and the Arctic to winter in the Rio Grande Valley in New Mexico. Bosque del Apache is a National Fish & Wildlife Service reserve dedicated to the care of visiting sandhill cranes, snow geese, and other migratory birds. This is image is the snow geese flock in the first rays of the morning sun.

In the early dawn, before sunrise, the snow geese gathered by the thousands in a communial pond

With a flurry of motion, the pond rapidly became quite full. For the next half hour, over ten thousand geese sat, socialized, confirmed their family groups were together, and generally acted like gregarious evening tourists at New York's Time Square.

Suddenly, ten minutes after sunrise, it seemed as if the breakfast bell rung. As if one, the ten thousand snow geese rose in a thunderous roar of wings and countless squawks and simultaneously departed for breakfast in a local field

it was similar the next day

and near the end of my stay

Meanwhile, the Sandhill Cranes were slowly beginning their day.