Date: 12/4/24 8:45 am From: Harry Armistead <harryarmistead...> Subject: [MDBirding] Tundra Swans' arrival
in response to messages about Swan flights in Nov. 2024 as reported by Dave Harp & Paul Spitzer I did some digging and:
November used to be a poignant time for me when we shut off the water and winterized our place. As a result I sometimes suffered some from mild seasonal affective disorder. But we’d still come down in winter, but with jerry cans full of water. The old coal oil stove only raised the temperature to the low 60s and that in just 3 rooms. The cats’ water bowl on the kitchen floor would sometimes freeze. Once when I entered the house after the Southern Dorchester Christmas Bird Count it was 18 in the dining room.
I’ve been lucky, as a non-resident, to have some swan sightings in Novembers. 2,715 Nov. 5, 1995. 750 Nov. 11, 1973. 530 Nov. 26, 1983. 460 Nov. 2, 1996. 400 Nov. 3, 1984 with Paul & my wife, Liz. 400 Nov. 6, 1971. 300 Nov. 10, 1973.
After the big SAV dieoff c. 1970 there are far fewer swans wintering here. The biggest numbers in winter, in the East, are in NE North Carolina.
I’ve traveled to all 7 continents, seen some terrific things, but it’s only a slight exaggeration to say that my most cherished memories were in Novembers when those great white birds would often appear high and in full cry towards day’s end, suffused with a lovely roseate hue from the low-angled late afternoon sun. Perhaps come all the way from Northwest Territories and Nunavut. Flying through areas with countless communication towers, wiring, aircraft, and other potentially fatal obstructions.
Small wonder they inspired such as Swanfall: journey of the Tundra Swan by Tom Horton & Dave Harp (Walker, 1991). And the marvelous Beston quotation. Beston’s The Outermost House was set in Cape Cod, well East of the flightpath of most Tundra Swans. But he would have felt good, I think, about the use of his quote here.
As Henry Beston wrote: "They shall not be measured by man; living by voices we shall never hear. In a world older and more complete than ours, they move finished and complete”. In connection with the swans and sent by Paul Spitzer
In the few years lately when I could STILL run, the only times when I did were to look for swans I heard on the other side of the house or across an intervening hedgerow. - Harry Armistead.
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