Swans on Braddock Bay . . .

Besides the mute or trumpeter swan inhabiting Braddock Bay, one of the few freshwater estuaries on the Great Lakes, there are migrating tundra or arctic swans which swoop down in large numbers in late winter, part of their yearly migration from the south to breeding grounds up north.Emptying into Braddock Bay, Salmon and Buttonwood Creeks drain a huge portion of western Monroe County, as far as the town of Sweden, releasing large amounts of sediment which restores the marshes ringing the bay. Migrating Canada geese, turkey vultures, songbirds, ducks, raptors [hawks] and swans are an essential part of a global ecosystem increasingly threatened by lack of habitat and forage. 

I photographed this trumpeter swan family last summer and was struck by the parents' protectiveness toward their cygnets. You can tell trumpeter from tundra by the orange on the bill of the trumpeter. Tundra swans' bills are all black. If we disregarded, chemically-killed or on other ways altered all the animal and plant 'invasive species' we see, we would have a lot of bare spots everywhere. We humans are also an invasive species as we know from our American history. 

I would hope that we see how genuinely fragile each species is and without invoking 'climate change' which will alter weather and habitat, we make adjustments rather than launching mechanical and chemical campaigns in our most important habitats.