Hutchinson ? Geese can appear stylish or silly, graceful or gawky.

They aren’t as striking as the occasional swan or duck in their midst, but in Hutchinson they have sheer numbers on their side.

The unadorned trees and monochrome coloring of the winter make the dark-capped heads of the Canada goose all the more visible, whether the birds are strutting on the grounds at Hutchinson’s Carey Park, swimming in lagoons, or behaving like bad drivers in the park  honking loudly and acting as if they own the road.

“They probably live here all year round,” said Steve Kinser, natural resource manager, as he looked out at geese in Dillon Nature Center’s pond one recent afternoon.

Some days, he said, the count can be as low as two geese  or as high as a thousand. On this particular afternoon, he judged the flock at 225.

A migratory bird, Canada geese forage for food around Hutchinson, but there is a sizable population that does not fly south for winter.

“They figure this is the Florida of the goose world,” Kinser said.

They are pretty much a resident population, said Charlotte Poepperling, director of the Hutchinson Zoo.

Kinser offers a morning meal  cracked corn and milo  to the geese, but the birds typically eat out for supper, perhaps pecking for morsels at a sand pit or a wheat field, or dropping in at Carey Park.

The zoo’s geese are fed, Poepperling said, but so many people feed the geese near the lagoons that no special feeding program for them is necessary.

Although Kinser said he’s never seen weather too cold for a goose, the birds must bulk up as much as possible in the fall before winter arrives.

George and Vi Mack brought food for the geese when they packed their fishing gear to the nature center recently.

Bread tossed onto the ice lured the geese, which, for their part, broke the ice with their weight. The birds swam away, leaving a wider fishing hole.

Kinser said the geese “tend to gossip,” and a sudden chorus of honks can arise over a dispute, with the geese  literally  displaying ruffled feathers as they disperse.

“They’re fun to watch,” Vi Mack said.