Restoration Inspiration from a Big, White Bird

Up close and personal with Ohio's largest bird, the Trumpeter Swan

This is a story for those moments in time when the question is posed (internally or by others), "Why does any of this matter?" What is the point of habitat protection and improvement when species are going extinct at alarming rates?

The photo above is the big reveal from the mystery image posted on April 8th. We did ultimately get the proper identification, but not surprisingly, it took some time. If shown an image of a large, white bird (in its entirety) on the water, most could recognize it to be a swan. But the trumpeter is to be appreciated for its uniqueness -- not only in its size and raw beauty but in how it came to be swimming in our marsh.

Legendary outdoor writer (and friend) Steve Pollick tells the tale in a succinctly written article from 2005. But in a nutshell, this species was completely wiped from the map in Ohio and beyond (extirpated) by 1900 and driven to the brink of extinction. Except for the rogue migrant, this magnificent bird was not seen again in the Midwest until it was reintroduced in the 1990s. Ohio was one of the first states to try its luck at relocating eggs from far north, rearing the young (called cygnets), and then eventually releasing juvenile birds into the wild. Lake Erie's southwestern shoreline was a logical nursery for the majority of these pioneers, but as Steve explains, in under a decade, there where over 100 individuals and 17 nesting pairs thriving within our boarders.

As of 2016 (twenty years into the restoration effort), the ODNR reports that we were up to 74 nesting pairs statewide -- again, most of which were oriented along the Lake. We were thrilled when a pair pulled up a muskrat hutch and made Standing Rush home. The four cygnets we watched through their first season last summer were one of just three nests in all of Erie County and represented ~2% of the State's entire population of new arrivals -- 178 total in 2016!

In just two short years on this property I'm already accumulating a growing list of memories associated with these birds. Each adult can grow to four feet tall and 25-30 pounds with a wingspan of about seven feet. They truly are the bomber planes of our avian skies. For about a week back in early February, our 40 acres of millet hosted as many as 40 trumpeters. It was a lesson that I keep reliving on the marsh: don't assume what you see today will be there tomorrow. But what I love most about these birds is how curious, almost precocious, they tend to be. I'm continually struck that it seems as if they are as interested in watching us as we are of watching them. And that's saying something.

[ASIDE: I'll have to explain our other two species of swans, Mute and Tundra, in a subsequent post -- one an invasive, the other just a brief visitor from way north.]