It's no secret. I don’t
like November. It’s a month of sad anniversaries and things-going-wrong.
But something nice! Earlier
this year a pair of swans had eight cygnets. We didn’t think they’d manage to
raise all eight safely, especially as some are what are known as Polish Mute
Swans.
I didn’t know this until I
was chatting to our local swan lady at 5 am during an early Dusty walk in
summer (she had just come from feeding them). She said the Polish swans are
often not as healthy. You can tell the difference as they don’t have the usual
brown plumage and their legs and feet are greyish pink.
She also told me that male
swans lose all their flight feathers and don’t get them back until it is time
to teach the young to fly. She was fascinating to talk to, telling me how she
got into swan rescue – I could have chatted with her all day!
We’ve watched the youngsters
grow and now they are almost the same size as their parents. We’ve seen them
take their first tentative flights and watched as they got bolder! One day all
ten were flying and the parents landed on the dyke, but the kids carried on!
You could almost hear the
parents muttering as they took off again and gave chase. One went to head the
kids off while the other flew round behind them and they herded them back to
the dyke. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to get a photo of them in the air.
I did get a wonderful one of them all on the sun spangled sea – except I didn’t.
When I checked my photos when I got home, I’d just taken photos of the sea and
completely missed the swans. I do miss having a viewfinder especially on a dazzling day!!
The other day Scout went down
to the edge of the dyke where the swans normally sit and for the first time
ever, she went deaf when I called her. The next thing we knew, she’d jumped in.
The water went right over her head and she panicked and scrabbled her way out
again. She’s paddled before, but that was her first swim.
She raced back up the bank to
us then the reason for her panic came into view, ten beautiful swans.
The other day she was chased
round the field by two small dogs. Two very small dogs. They were smaller than
Westies and she was genuinely terrified. She has no concept of how big she is and is still only 10 months old.
She is lovely though and so
tall that Dusty can walk underneath her.
I’m still working mainly on
my laptop downstairs as I still can’t sit at my desk for too long and sometimes working on the laptop has its disadvantages... or advantages depending on how you look at it!
