Trumpeter Swan
Trumpeter
swans historically nested on freshwater lakes and marshes in a
wide band across the northern United States, Canada and Alaska,
and may have occurred in numbers as high as 100,000 birds.
However, nearly all of the population east of the Rocky
Mountains was extirpated in the late 1800s as a result of
unregulated market hunting and habitat loss. Beginning in the
early 1960s, state wildlife agencies and the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service mounted a series of restoration efforts to
return the trumpeter swan to the Midwest through the release of
birds into Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Michigan and Ohio. During
the past 40 years, this Midwestern population has grown from a
few hundred released birds to a thriving and reproducing
population of over 4,500 birds in six states and the province of
Ontario.
Oklahoma lies substantially south of the trumpeter swan’s
historic nesting range, but at one time our state was the
wintering home for many hundreds, if not thousands of trumpeter
swans. History is now repeating itself with growing numbers of
trumpeter swans once again wintering in Oklahoma as the
Midwestern population recovers. Many of the trumpeter swans that
visit Oklahoma originate from the re-established nesting
populations in Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin. In Oklahoma, these
birds occupy large ponds and wetlands and are found primarily in
the northeastern and northcentral portions of the state. A few
additional wintering swans migrate down from a High Plains
population that was recently established in South Dakota,
Nebraska and Wyoming.
These swans winter primarily on ponds and flood control lakes in
western Oklahoma. Trumpeter swans typically occur in Oklahoma
during the mid-winter – roughly between late November and late
February.
The trumpeter swan is the largest species of waterfowl in North
American and the larger of the two native swan species. These
birds often live 20 to 25 years and pairs may remain together
for ten or more nesting seasons. Each summer, the pair jointly
raises a brood of one to six young known as cygnets. The young
swans typically remain with their parent during their first
summer and winter in order to learn how to find food and avoid
predators and other hazards. Because of their strong family
bonds, most trumpeter swan sightings in Oklahoma are of family
groups. These groups are commonly comprised of one or two adult
pairs and two to eight juvenile birds. Adult trumpeter swans
have completely white plumage, and a relatively long, sloping
bill that is solid black and somewhat wedge-shaped. Young
trumpeter swans have plumage that is sooty gray in color, and
have a patch of pinkish-orange color on their predominantly
black bills.
Many of the nesting swans in Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota are
marked with colored neck bands - long collars that are placed
around the lower portion of the swan’s neck. These bands or
collars are red or green in color and are printed with a unique
combination of letters and numbers. Using the collars,
biologists can track specific birds and identify their
traditional nesting and wintering areas. In recent years, many
of the trumpeter swans sighted in Oklahoma have originated from
birds released onto wetlands in central Iowa. The Oklahoma
Wildlife Diversity Program assists the Trumpeter Swan Society
which is a non-profit organization based in Minnesota that helps
to track and monitor the Midwestern swan population. All
winter-time swan sightings are noteworthy, but we are especially
interested in any observations of collared swans. Recording the
locations of collared swans can help us document migration
routes between their northern nesting areas and the suitable
wintering areas that occur in Oklahoma. If you observe a swan
with a neck collar, please contact the Wildlife Diversity
Program or the Trumpeter Swan Society through their Trumpeter
Watch program.