SWAN: sad story of beauty and the beasts

BEAUTIFUL and majestic, swans have the power to charm us like few other birds as they glide elegantly by in the water.

A group of swans on my local pond reminded me of this fact the other day as they drew admiring comments from onlookers.

Bigger and more regal than geese, it is not hard to see why swans enjoy special historical links to the Crown - despite the fact that swans were once more likely to be seen on platters at a giant royal feast than taking titbits from passers-by.

With their snow-white feathers and long graceful necks, swans could be birds created in a fairytale, which is probably why they captured the hearts of poets down the ages.

Strangely, a lot of the poems I've read link them with death or dying, which seems a tad unfair on such a vivacious creature.

This, by Alfred Lord Tennyson, is a fairly typical reference:"The woods decay, the woods decay and fall, The vapours weep their burthen to the ground, Man comes and tills the field and lies beneath, And after many a summer dies the swan."

Thanks for that, Alf.

Not the cheeriest way to think of a bird which, more often than not, actually cheers you up.

We are lucky in this country to have three main species of swan to enjoy; the Mute swan, Bewick's swan, and Whooper swan. (The Australian black swan is more of an ornamental import)

The smallest of this white trio at only eight kilogrammes, the Bewick's swan has an impressive flight record, making a perilous migration back to our shores from Siberia each year.

The Whooper, too, makes it over here from Iceland every winter when temperatures there plunge too low for comfort - quite an achievement for a bird weighing up to 14 kilogrammes.

The Mute swan, similarly large, could probably be classed as our most 'native' swan though it has declined in many areas due to a combination of factors, including being poisoned by eating anglers' lead shot.

Despite their physical beauty, swans can be aggressive and there are many tales of them killing or badly injuring other water birds that come too close to their nests at breeding time.

Even so, from childhood, I can still remember the outrage that was sparked in my village when louts attacked two swans which had nested beside a local stretch of water year after year.

The female always settled in a patch of wild rhubarb close to some trees and the sight of her leading her downy chicks to water was an annual treat for we toddlers.

However, these yobs - who were never caught, I believe - decided to put paid to all that.

Not content with killing the male with bricks, they smashed all the eggs and drove the female away.

She returned briefly a day or so later, pining for her dead partner.

It was a small tragedy in the general scheme of things but it still left a mark on me when I was told about it.

Long after the wild rhubarb was cleared and the area surrounding the lake flattened and landscaped into a kind of barren green desert, I still remembered what had happened there.

Perhaps those poets had it right after all.

Perhaps it takes the death of a swan to make you realise what you've lost.