Hooper Swans ??

[AlJones]

I was walking along the sea wall at Heybridge Basin the other day and was drawn to an eery sound coming across the calm water. There were three swans swimming towards the middle of the river, calling ... and they looked different to our usuals swans. I feel they may be hooper swans, which I don't recall seeing around here before ... has anyone else seen them and are they indeed unusual visitors to these parts?

Typical - for the first time in ages I didn't have the camera with me!!

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[Flizzaff]

I don't know what you've seen but here in Sweden I sometimes see a swan with yellow (nose). We call it 'songswan'. The neck is straight.
The more common swan upp here is a sort with orange nose and we call it 'Knölsvan': The swan has a little hill upp on his (nose). The neck of this swan describes an S-form.

Please describe your swan if you remember the colours and 'hills'!
Here I think the 'songsvan' visit us only in the springtime.

 

[tillergirl]

From my little 'bird' book

The text says that the Whooper is 'Noisy; when swimming a goose-like 'ang', in flight a disyllabic 'ang ha' That's the middle one. The bottom one is the Bewick's Swan - 'Call higher and softer than Whooper Swan 'huh huh' or 'kuru'. Both described as winter visitors.

Source is Collins 'Birds of Britain and Europe'

 

[AlJones]

Hi Roger,

It was Tina who saw them, and says they are more like the ones in your second photo.

Thanks to you both for your posts.

Al.

 

[tillergirl]

Hi Al

Enjoying the BS I see. I have seen three Black Swans this year over the Stroud, no doubt heading for Abberton where I've seen them before. Presumably escaped from somewhere

Roger

 

[johnalison]

It used to be an argument used by mediaeval philosophers that there were some things about which one could be certain, such as that all swans are white. That was before they discovered Australia (where they come from).