By Sharon Sorenson (Contact)
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Sixteen years ago, a young trumpeter swan was released in northwestern Wisconsin. Last week, that bird's great-grandchild, now 3 years old, gave Hoosiers along the Wabash River a bit of excitement.
Trumpeter swans, once common throughout the Midwest, were hunted to extinction in the late 1800s. Their all-white feathers and skins went to Europe to make women's hats and powder puffs; their strong flight feathers made superior quill pens. Outside the Midwest, a few hundred trumpeters remained huddled in shallow wetlands in the remote Northwest up through Alaska.
After 175 years or so, in 1966, natural resource agencies in Minnesota began a program to reintroduce trumpeters to the Midwest. By the 1980s, Michigan and Wisconsin joined the effort to establish breeding and migratory flocks.
Thus, the great-grandchild trumpeter and its nine companions, loafing and feeding along the Wabash, caused a stir. Of the 10, two were juveniles (great-great-grandchildren) still in their dusky plumage. But to add to the excitement, four adults wore bright yellow collars. By enlarging photos, we could read the number: 97K. The hunt was on. Where did these birds come from? And where were they going?
The yellow-color neck bands confirmed that the birds were, indeed, trumpeter swans; and the number-letter code led us to the Wisconsin DNR, where we found Pat Manthey. "Yes," she exclaimed, "those are my birds. They were banded at Crex Meadows Wildlife Area in northwestern Wisconsin in 2006. Where are they now?" At hearing the birds were well, loafing along the banks of the Wabash, Manthey's excitement literally sang over the phone.
And so we learned that these ten trumpeters have stuck together as an extended family, will migrate back to Crex Meadows as a family, and that the pairs will remain life-long partners. The juveniles, probably siblings, are likely the only two remaining from a clutch of six or eight. And if they can avoid cars, guns and lead (especially poisoning from consuming lead shot and lead fishing sinkers), they can live up to 25 years.
In 1985, there were zero trumpeter swans in the Great Lakes area. Now about 740 birds breed in Michigan, 700 in Wisconsin and 1,000 in Ontario; all move south in winter. Although not listed as federally endangered, trumpeters are actually far more rare than bald eagles. So finding them here surely brightened the day.
What handsome birds: tall, straight-necked, full-bodied, all-white gleaming plumage, black-billed, alert, majestic. Their call reflects their name, a resonating but peaceful bugle. On 8-foot wingspans, their flight strokes, strong and deep, whoosh through frigid air, leaving me gape-mouthed, murmuring, "What a sight, here in Indiana."
Of the three swans in NA, trumpeter swans are by far our largest native waterfowl, weighing up to 35 pounds, standing 4 feet tall. These big guys outweigh their look-alike and more common cousins, tundra swans, by almost double. A third species, the mute swan, introduced from Europe, has escaped or been accidentally released from zoos or parks, resulting in undesirable distribution into the wild.
A lifelong area resident and backyard birder, Sharon Sorenson shares observations about birds in a biweekly columnContact her by e-mail at forthebirdscolumn@yahoo.com
Comments
Peg Abbott, the Trumpeter Swan Society