Educating Risa

 

I took the boys for a bird walk at Glenmore Reservoir, about 10 minutes drive from our home, this morning, after hearing from several people on my alberta-birds email list that hundreds of swans were there on migration—both trumpeter and tundra swans. As we had recently read the book Trumpet of the Swans, I thought the boys would enjoy seeing if we could find Louis and his family. Here’s some pics (hover your mouse over for details):

There were hundreds of swans there, along with many other types of water birds. Telling tundra and trumpeter swans apart from a distance is tricky, as close-up you can often see a bit of yellow (“yellow tear”) between the eye and bill on the tundra. From a distance you rely on overall body size (trumpeters are bigger than tundras), colour (tundras are somewhat whiter; trumpeters somewhat greyer), the way they hold their necks (tundras straight / upright, trumpeters curvy at the base) and bill (trumpeter bills seem larger and like it blends right into their face; tundras have a more distinct face with a smaller bill “attached” as an afterthought). I am by no means an expert, but I think I have spotted the two types of swans in the pic below:

The birds also sound different. The call of the tundra is higher-pitched and more nasal; the trumpeter has a very low, booming Honk! Honk! It echoed all across the lake when these trumpeters got into a battle (over a mate, I assume—the swan furthest to the left):

It’s hard to get a sense of how large these birds are, but this should help. Here’s a trumpeter swan that was followed closely by two mallard ducks while feeding. I am not sure why—perhaps in dabbling for food, the larger swan stirs up some easy pickings for the ducks? But mallards are fair-sized ducks in their own right, and the trumpeter positively towers over them:

We saw lots of other water birds as well. Like:

It was a lovely way to spend a morning.