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Swans Come Calling
They're among the heaviest of all flying birds!
© Mick Thompson
Trumpeter Swans are among the world's largest flying waterfowl. They can weight up to 25 pounds and have a wingspan of nearly seven feet! These swans migrate in family groups each fall from nesting sites in Canada and Alaska to wintering grounds in the central U.S. Trumpeter Swans are sometimes accompanied by their smaller cousins, the Tundra Swan. Both swan species look similar to each other, but their voices are distinct!
BirdNote®
Swans Come Calling
Written by Bob Sundstrom
This is BirdNote.
[Trumpeter Swans’ honking, trumpet-like calls]
With deep, unhurried wing-beats, a dozen majestic swans fly in a straight line, their immense, white bodies glistening in the golden sunlight of a November morning. As they fly closer, their long necks fully outstretched, the swans’ syncopated honks reveal their identity: these are Trumpeter Swans.
[Trumpeter Swans trumpeting]
The flock lands in a plowed field to forage for remnant potatoes and other waste crops. With an almost seven-foot wingspan, Trumpeter Swans are among the largest of all waterfowl. At nearly twenty-five pounds, they are among the heaviest of all flying birds.
Now a second formation of swans flies in to forage near the Trumpeters, but these swans announce themselves with a different voice. [Tundra Swans calling] Just a bit smaller than the Trumpeters, their distinctive whoops tell us they are Tundra Swans, a different species.
[Tundra Swans calling]
Both species of swans fly south each fall from nesting sites in Canada and Alaska. Trumpeter Swans winter mostly in the Pacific Northwest, while Tundra Swans can be found along both coasts, and at a variety of inland sites in the west.
[Tundra Swans calling]
You can see these spectacular birds on their wintering grounds any time between now and the middle of March.
For BirdNote, I'm Mary McCann.
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Senior Producer: Mark Bramhill
Producer: Sam Johnson
Managing Producer: Jazzi Johnson
Managing Producer: Ariana Remmel
Content Director: Jonese Franklin
Calls of the swans provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. The light call and wing beat of Trumpeter Swans recorded by J.M. Hartshorne; the call of Tundra Swans recorded by B.McCaffrey. BirdNote’s theme was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
©2014 Tune In to Nature.org November 2016/2021/2023/2025
Narrator: Mary McCann
ID# TRUS-tundra-01b-2021-11-20
Bob Sundstrom
Writer
Mary McCann
NarratorSights & Sounds
