Swans and geese

[stripes4]

'My' swans are massed just now. They are all in one patch of meadow on the moors.... 40 of them! I've only ever counted 24 before and that is spread out over the 5 minute drive across this area. It's fabulous to see them all together.

That sounds amazing. I am lucky to live next to a canal (the Trent Mersey canal). We have a family of swans, and a heron that lives on our doorstep, practically. The heron is beautiful and it never ceases to fascinate me to watch it stand still for minutes on end, at the side of the water. Lovely

[JimC]

Plenty of Black Swans to be found on waterways near us. Feisty buggers, too, they will run at you hissing sometimes...

[Faithfree]

Here's one of my local swans:

They breed and raise young in the park lands next to work.

[M]

Must try to get a pic of my gang. Will take camera to work next week.

[Tero]

Read The Geese of Beaver Pond by Bernd Heinrich for insight. geese have separate breeding and raising young lakes.

[mistermack]

Geese are fabulous animals. I have three in my freezer.
My family in Ireland used to keep a flock of semi-wild ones, and they taste amazing.
They are great to have around as well. It's one of the best farm sounds, it really makes a place feel homely.
And they are entertaining, and cute when they are small.

[Bella Fortuna]

Tundra swans and greater white-fronted geese, last weekend:

[mistermack]

Yum yum !! Pig's bum!!

Apple tart and chewing gum!!

[Geoff]

There's a reservoir I go walking around a lot, with all kinds of waterfowl, 2 resident breeding pairs of swans, cormorants, herons, Canada Geese, Grebes, Coots..I love going especially when the eggs are recently hatched.

(not my pix, I'm a lousy cameraman!)

[M]

Aren't cygnets just delightful?

[Geoff]

Aren't cygnets just delightful?

My daughter still calls them ugly ducklings - she's 22 yrs old now...

[M]

Aren't cygnets just delightful?

My daughter still calls them ugly ducklings - she's 22 yrs old now...

Don't we all?!

[Mysturji]

Over the last 3 years I have driven to work over what are locally called 'the moors'; low/wetland criss-crossed with ditches. It is home to several swan families and last year one pair had 6 young. It's been great watching them grow and they are now huge grubby teenagers.

However, further along my route is a pair with no young. At the beginning of this week, they were joined by a pair of Canada geese. They were all happily feeding in a very tight space. This morning there were 8 geese and they still still seemed to be getting along just fine, feeding in a tight knit group. There don't seem to be geese anywhere else in the area. Is this usual?

Canadians are naturally very polite.
They get along with everyone.

[Faithfree]

There is a fenced parkland close to my work that I can see from my 5th floor office window. It has a large pond, in and around which black swans often raise cygnets. The park is surrounded by very busy roads and there are signs saying keep the gates closed for the safety of the cygnets. One day a few years ago I looked of my window and saw a mother swan with half a dozen cygnets wandering out towards the road because someone had left the gate open. They waddled up to the pedestrian crossing at the intersection, then stopped. After a while the lights changed and the green walk man came on. They waddled across the crossing in front of the stopped cars to the smaller park on the other side. I have no idea if they made it back home safely.

[Faithfree]

Today I was walking along the coast in southern Cumbria. There was a lone swan in the sea, just visible on the right.


As I got closer it came out of the sea and waddled very awkwardly across the stones towards me.


It stopped at my feet, tilted it's head and looked up.



I didn't have any food for it so after a couple of minutes it waddled awkwardly back to the sea.