Swans, hawk

Swans have been seen at the two ends of the Main Lake for some weeks now. But, prior to this morning, I had seen none along the West Arm.

In April, I normally watch for swans at Robert’s Bay (in front of Blaylock’s), and on either side of Kokanee Creek Park. The extensive shallows at these locations only seem to appeal to swans when the Lake is quite low (as it becomes in April) for then their long necks enable them to forage on the lake bottom.

So far, I have seen swans at neither location, but an early morning phone call from a neighbour alerted me to swans at an unexpected place: along the south shore near the mouth of Laska Creek.

So, which type of swan were they: Tundra or Trumpeter? I could get no closer than a half–kilometre across the water. I took pictures anyway (right, below). There were a dozen of them and they were almost certainly Tundra Swans. Unfortunately, by mid morning they had all moved on.

The Kootenay Lake website offers more pictures of local Tundra Swans and of Red-tailed Hawks.

The great distance to the swans and the fact that it was raining at the time made for rather poor portraits. This was not the case the day before, when I was on a trip into Nelson, a Red–tailed Hawk flew fairly close to the car. What can I say: my camera was ready and produced what I rate as a thoroughly satisfying image (the last picture below). I hasten to note that I was not the driver in the car during this encounter.