No swan food donations this winter please. Spend your money on a new wooly sweater, or cross-country skis or maybe even a fruitcake?
Not being an exercise freak myself, I'd prefer the fruit cake (the light batter with lots of cherries) and I'd sit with my coffee and light fruitcake and reminisce about the 42 years I'd known our swans. First there was Anthony and Cleopatra (a gift from Stratford, Ontario), then Cleopatra the Second (also from Stratford), their son Caesar (a gift from Greenook Lake) and his pen Cleotoo, who dropped in from out of the blue. The first Cleopatra was too frail to abide a winter out of doors on Greenook. She died before ever nesting. Cleopatra the Second shared Greenook with Anthony until l970 and then with Caesar until l988 when cardiac problems ended her life. She brightened my days for 26 years. Her son and mate Caesar thrived on your winter donations for 33 years and that's about as ripe an age that a swan can get.
As reported earlier, Caesar passed away in July at Domino's and Cleotoo had to leave Greenook when the spillway gate was finally opened around Labor Day. I saw her twice on the river near the Boyden Creek exit and I am sure she is still searching for Caesar. But come spring if there are any single cobs on the river, she has a chance of joining up with one. I'm certain of one thing - they will not be nesting on “Mudnook” Lake.