Salish Seasonal Guide

Swans

Winter is the best time to see these big, beautiful birds up close.

When to go:

November, December, January, or February.

Where to go:

• Skagit Flats

What to look for:

Swans like lakes and ponds where they feed on water plants, and open flat fields where they can eat grass and leftover grain. Cut farm fields are especially good for attracting them.

Since swans are so big (their wingspan can be 8 feet!) and so white, they are usually very easy to spot, even from your car. If you see a gray swan, it's a juvenile.

• Trumpeter Swan

  These beautiful birds are the largest species of waterfowl in the world. Aside from their size, they look very much like the smaller Tundra swan (below), which also shows up in the Northwest in winter. Telling the two species apart can be tricky, especially if they aren't standing next to each other for easy size comparison.

  Trumpeter Swans have black bills and when they are swimming their necks are very straight and upright - not at all like the classic curved "swanlike" posture most people imagine.

• Tundra Swan

  Tundra swans look a lot like Trumpeter swans (above), but they are quite a bit smaller. They often have a yellow spot or patch on their bill near the eye, but not always. If you see yellow, it's a Tundra swan - if there is no yellow, it could be either species!

  When swimming, a Tundra swan's neck is straight and upright, but it will "kink" backwards at the base before going up. It looks almost as though the birds are slouching. This postural difference, once you learn to spot it, can be key in telling Trumpeters from Tundras.

• Mute Swan

  The Mute swan is an introduced species from Eurasia, and they are now quite common throughout North America. They are not actually mute, although they seem to call less often than other swan species.

  Mute swans are easy to identify. They are almost as large as Trumpeter swans, but they have bright orange bills. They also have a distinctive knob on their forehead. Mute swans carry their necks in the classic "swanlike" curve while swimming.

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Sources:
The Cornell Lab of Ornithology All About Birds, 2012
Peterson Field Guide to Birds of Western North America, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt 2010
The Northwest Nature Guide, Timber Press 2009
Images by USFWS