Dr. Robert Schuler, Professor
153D Harvey Hall
715.232.1454
schulerr@uwstout.edu
Fax: 715.232.2093

"Cosmic Events on Swan Lake: Arrival of the Tundra Swans"

Swan Lake

   Last Friday, late in October, five thousand tundra swans arrived here from the Arctic Circle. It is Sunday afternoon, and flights of them are filling the cold winds. Tundra swans are huge birds; they weigh from twenty to twenty five pounds, and their wings stretch out to seven feet. I can see their breast muscles ripple and hear their feathers rustle as they fly directly overhead against a pewter-gray sky.

    These magnificent animals emerge from the unimaginable distances and terrain of the far north. One can find their nests north of the Arctic Circle to about Latitude 79 degrees North, from the Alaska Peninsula and the wet tundra of Kotzebue, to Hudson Bay, Baffin Island, and the Ungava Peninsula. Eggs are laid in late May or early June. The young hatch in late June or early July. In late October or early November they mount storm winds and migrate south in flocks of thirteen to fifteen birds, sometimes at one hundred miles an hour.

    The swans visit the small lake, ponds, and sloughs in the area near Alma, Wisconsin, a tiny town on the Mississippi River, to dine on the tubers of arrowhead, "duck potatoes," store energy, and rest for their demanding next flight, the last stage of their migration, to Chesapeake Bay. They root up the arrowhead tubers with their long legs, and then arc their necks under the water to capture them. You can watch them swallow the tubers, the bulges sliding down their necks, as if they were round-bodied mice. They spend most of the day eating and floating about the lake, often with their necks tucked into their wings.

    While the swans feasted, floated, and chatted, thousands of mallards, in flight after flight, take off and pepper the air. They have been attracted by food particles stirred up by the vigorous feeding of the swans. Even more flights of mallards are sailing in from the northeast. If the mallards had stayed in the lake, there would have been absolutely no room for the swans or the Canada geese parading the shallows of the backwaters.

    In the late afternoon the swans take off for a short exercise flight. Today strong blasts of wind force them to wheel round the lake to get their bearings before they head due west. For the past hour they have been streaming over the Swan Watch observation platform on shore.

    The swans are not the only participants in todayís "cosmic events," as my friend calls them. Six eagles have mounted the high winds. Two are soaring slowly, turning their breasts into the wind on occasion, kiting like hawks. Four play courtship games that attract our full attention:

Inverting #1

two eagles circling

one dives

at the other who soars

rolls over

onto her back

"accepts"

him who thinks

he is king

over all below

and he is

hooked

taloned

subdued by the Queen

and they cartwheel

over and over

down

until she breaks away

chased

silver

into the cracked woods

    The eagle dance done, the swan dance begins again. Returning from their short practice flights, squadrons of swans, white adults and sooty cygnets, wheel over the lake, spread their wings fully out, and parachute down. The long glide is lovely, and they gracefully add swirls and a slight tipping of the wings until they can stretch their black feet out and skid softly into the water. It is getting dark, my hands and my face are freezing, and I am getting hungry. Time to go home. Iíll be back tomorrow or Tuesday at the latest. These birds usually do not leave for the Chesapeake until late November. Some of them were spotted just below town as late as December 16 last year.

    Alas, on Tuesday thick plates of ice have diminished the lake. Only four hundred swans remain. They huddle together in the shallows, leaning their necks together, feathertips touching, or float side by side, attempting to pass warmth to one another. They are silent, and they seem to be shivering. It is so cold that steam shivers in streams from the lake. This will probably be one of the last days I can watch them, for it is certain, it gets colder day by day, that they will all be gone this year by mid-November. At four they begin to whistle, hiss, grunt, and chatter. Groups of four or five swim slowly into a line and suddenly run at the water. They lash with their wings and legs for yards until they rise into the blurred air.