AJAY TEGALA: I was just having my morning coffee in the kitchen

and I heard this distant kind of goose-like honking outside so I

ran outside. Ah yes and there they are. My first whooper swans

of the autumn. Ah they're quite a long way away but ah that

distinctive sound I haven't heard it for six months but

there they are fresh from Iceland. Ah it's so good to see

them. Welcome back swans.

ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: Did you know that the UK is home to three

different species of swan and that one crosses a Siberian

Tundra to get here? Well today, swan fan and wetland ranger Ajay

Tegala is taking us to the Ouse Washes at Welney in Norfolk, to

see if we can find this increasingly rare and

hardworking swan amongst thousands of its hooping

cousins.

Welcome to Wild Tales, finding the Tundra swans.

AJAY TEGALA: Every autumn, over my house, I hear resonant calls

that sound a bit like a brass band tuning up.

The arrival of hundreds of wild whooper swans is an anticipated

and celebrated moment in my calendar. But there is one swan

species I very rarely see. A swan that has eluded me for the

last few winters. I'm determined that this year I'll see them

again. The Bewick's swan.

Back in January 2021, I spotted a flock of swans in the field

next to my house. Looking through a telescope from the

kitchen window, there were two Bewick's swans.

Sometimes known as the Tundra swan for its epic migration, or

the small swan, the once populous bird is becoming

increasingly rare. I wanted to speak to someone who knew

Bewick's swans in extraordinary detail. Someone who might

understand why I was so desperate to see them again.

DAFILA SCOTT: I remember drawing the birds outside my father's

studio window when I was quite small and that eventually led to

painting.

AJAY TEGALA: This is Dafila Scott, an artist and zoologist.

She spent her childhood at Slimbridge, a wetland wildlife

reserve, as her father, Sir Peter Scott, was the founder of

the Wildfowl And Wetlands Trust. So, from a young age, birds were

a big part of her life.

We sit in the cafe on the edge of Wicken Fen, with the wetlands

out the window and the bustle of warm life surrounding us.

DAFILA SCOTT: February 1964, my father decided to bring the tame

whistling swans from the collection to the pond in front

of his house. And almost immediately, the wild Bewick's

swans, which had been coming to the Severn Estuary for some

time, came down onto the pond in front of his house. And this was

very exciting.

And he noticed that the one that came the first day was different

from the one that came the second day. And that the pattern

of the black and yellow on the bills was different. And so he

drew them. He then started to record all the individuals that

came that winter.

So there were 24 that first winter, and he gave them names

because that was easier to remember than numbers. And then

the next year, when they came back again, some of them brought

their signets with them. I think it was that year that I was ill

and from school and I had to convalesce indoors.

And so what was to do but look out the window at these

wonderful swans? And I got completely hooked identifying

them and drawing the patterns and recognizing them. Watching

their behaviour, seeing, you know, who had cygnets, who

didn't, who was mated with who, and who was dominant on the

pond. Anyway, it was completely riveting.

AJAY TEGALA: For Dafila, drawing the swans was a necessity as

well as a love.

DAFILA SCOTT: Because in those days, there weren't cameras that

would focus in on individuals, you know, halfway across the

pond. So you had to look through a telescope or large binoculars

and then draw the pattern. And my father had devised...

a sort of cycler-styled face. So you drew the two sides and the

front view as meticulously as you could. And he was very

precise about it. You had to get it right. But it was very good

practice for looking and then drawing. So now I'm a painter.

But I also like watching the behaviour of animals still very

much. And Bewick's swans are, of course, my favourite animal.

AJAY TEGALA: And so the ones that you knew as individuals, it

was obviously this precise pattern of black and yellow that

you were drawing. And that's how you got to know them by their

bills.

DAFILA SCOTT: Yes, that's right. And also just the way the animal

carries its head. So some of them, we used to have one called

Pussycat, which had her head in the air all the time. She was

always looking around with her head in the air. So they have

their individual characteristics and you get to know them. And

that's, it's very good fun.

I mean if you're, you know, if you're really watching a flock

and you get to know them all it's it's just wonderful

following them. It's very exciting.

AJAY TEGALA: I guess it's quite similar to, I'm lucky i work

with the grazing livestock here at Wicken and it's that sense of

when you have that time to spend with these individuals you get

to know their personalities and they are all unique. It's a

lovely it's a lovely way to spend time isn't it watching

animal behaviour.

DAFILA SCOTT: It's so lovely I mean I get fond of the wild

ducks that come to the bottom of my garden and I'll feed them a

little bit but i couldn't tell if there was a different one

coming. Whereas, you know, with the Bewick's, you can look at

them and you can so quickly recognise individuals. It

really, it's very special.

AJAY TEGALA: After talking to Dafila, I'm even more determined

to see them again. At Wicken Fen, I see or hear whooper swans

most days throughout the winter, but never Bewick's. And I don't

think I'll get quite so lucky with my kitchen window, so I

head to WWT Welney. Where the Ouse Washes provide a winter

retreat for thousands of swans.

LIZZIE BRUCE: I think early morning in the winter is really

special. Particularly when you get that nice misty Fenland

morning and the skies are clear and you have the sun rising and

the swans are waking up in the morning so they start getting

really talkative to one another, flapping their wings. And you

kind of sense their excitement that the day is starting and

then they'll lift off the washes and then fly over your heads.

In like big flocks of like bees calling and then go out to the

fields and feed during the day and if you're lucky you'll pick

out the Bewick's swans.

AJAY TEGALA: This is Lizzie Bruce the site manager of

Welney. We meet in the heated bird hide with panoramic windows

that give views across the wetland. It's the perfect place

for spotting winter visitors.

Of course the stars this time of year are the swans and your work

involves a lot of monitoring of the swans.

LIZZIE BRUCE: Yes, so Welney and the Ouse Washes are

internationally important for its wintering Bewick's swans and

whooper swans. So here at WWT we've been monitoring the

populations along with our partners for decades.

So the washes are really important for a safe roosting

place for the swans at night. And then in the morning they'll

go off to feed. So we will get up at cracker sparrows and count

all the swans coming off the washes and going out into the

field. And then during the day, we then go driving around the

fens across the farmland and in small teams we then count the

birds again.

So we'll count the total flock size, so how many whooper swans

and how many Bewick's swans are in each flock. So we can then

understand what is the population doing, but also

identify where there are important feeding and roosting

locations that we can then protect to ensure they can

winter here undisturbed.

AJAY TEGALA: I always used to get teased that all I did was

counting birds, like how hard can that be? But actually it can

be quite challenging.

LIZZIE BRUCE: Yeah, on this scale it can be really

challenging and last week we were doing the swan count out in

the arable fields and it was one of those really windy days where

it's really gusty.

So we're setting up a tripod to scan through the flocks that can

be several hundred metres away and the scope is rocking from

side to side. So you're seeing almost like double through the

scope and then you've got the wind blowing and your eyes are

watering. It can be yeah on those days quite a challenge but

yeah it's still good.

AJAY TEGALA: The swans we're talking about here aren't the

sort you'll see in your local park. The whoopers and the

Bewick's are distinct species and can be distinguished from

each other by their size and behaviour. At first glance, they

may look very similar, but Lizzie has a good way to tell

them apart. For the whooper swans, the yellow extends

further along their bill.

LIZZIE BRUCE: It's almost like a wedge of cheese. That's kind of

the easiest way we describe it. And then the Bewick's swans,

their bill is predominantly black with a very small sort of

spot of yellow and it's more like a knob of butter.

AJAY TEGALA: Brilliant. I love that analogy.

Both whooper and Bewick's swans spend their winter here with us.

But their journeys are very different.

LIZZIE BRUCE: The whooper Swans here in Britain have all come

from Iceland, so we get the entire Icelandic population

wintering in Britain and Ireland. And the Bewick's swan,

they've come from Russia, so the Tundra up in Russia, and they

have a 3,500-kilometre migration.

AJAY TEGALA: And, of course, they come here for a couple of

reasons, the climate, the availability of food, like the

sugar beet tops, and this important wetland that you

manage, because I live nearby. I just love it when they arrive in

the autumn and you think they've come all the way from Iceland

and they're coming here to my home patch. It's really

exciting.

LIZZIE BRUCE: It's so magical. I know when we first hear the

whooper swans, we all get really excited. It's really

heartwarming as well to see some of those birds come back and

know that they've had a successful migration back home

to breed. And then they come back and even better if they've

got cygnets with them. Yeah, it just makes you all feel warm and

fuzzy inside. It's lovely.

AJAY TEGALA: So you get quite an insight into their lives with

the monitoring work as well. And I know that you've just been

number crunching over the last few days from the latest count.

Can you tell us a bit more about that?

LIZZIE BRUCE: Yes, so it's a team effort. So while WWT lead

on it locally here, we work with RSPB and National Trust and all

our wetlands. So our numbers are, for whooper swans last

week, we counted about 8,600 birds roosting on the Ouse

Washes at night. And they were joined by about 50 Bewick's

swans.

And then when we went out, around the fields around the

Ouse Washes and the eemwashes we then counted a total of 13,000

whooper swans and they had about a thousand juveniles in those

flocks. And then Bewick's swans we found 68 Bewick's swans and

14 juveniles. So while whooper swans are going up we are sadly

seeing the Bewick's swan population decline. So these

counts we did last week are the lowest Bewick counts we've had

on records and a research was just published in the last week

that suggested that the Bewick's swan population has actually,

European population, has actually declined by 56% since

1995, which partly reflects why we're seeing such low numbers

here.

But what we're also seeing Bewick's swans do is something

called short stopping. So this is when the Bewick's swans are

not migrating as far as they used to. So historically, they

would have moved as the cold weather sort of pushed them

westwards but now we've got warmer winters the Bewick's

swans are favouring Germany so they are seeing more and less

here.

AJAY TEGALA: Behind us in the hide, a huge map with yellow

lines draws out a migration that spans the entire length of

Europe from the Russian Tundra.

LIZZIE BRUCE: So you can see on here the Bewick's swans and then

they'll head west mainly by night following the coast and

they can cover about

2,000 miles before they get to us here at Welney and they can

stop off at places like Netherlands, Germany, Denmark,

Belgium. And it's not a quick migration you know it can take

about six weeks from their breeding grounds to reach their

final wintering grounds here at Welney or increasingly in

Germany.

It's really fascinating to see where they've come from but also

some of challenges that they face during their migration. So

up in Russia, they're particularly faced by climate

change and the warming of the Tundra, making it wetter and

less favourable for them.

As you go further west, there's sort of change in food

availability. They also do face illegal hunting along their

journey. So because they're the size of a goose, they can be

mistaken for a goose, so they can be illegally shot. And then

as they come more towards Europe and us, they then can encounter

power lines. So yeah, there's quite a lot of challenges.

Beyond it just being 2,000 miles.

AJAY TEGALA: Of course, you've been here a relatively short

period of time, but you've seen extremes in water levels and

weather and temperature, haven't you?

LIZZIE BRUCE: Yeah, so, you know, we all know that we're

kind of in this climate crisis. The climate is changing. And so,

yeah, I've been at Wellney for about two years now. It started

off with our wettest year, with prolonged winter flooding, well

into the sort of breeding season and then starting again really

early in September.

And, you know, it's important to say that Ouse Washes is flood

storage. So it is doing what it's meant to do. It is

protecting farmland and homes from flooding. However, what we

are seeing is that it's becoming more extreme, more prolonged,

which has a negative impact on the wildlife.

And then this year we've had now had our driest year and looking

at the long-range forecast it looks like we're going to go

into next year on some of our sites with really low water

levels which again has an impact on our wildlife. So yeah we are

working with farmers with landowners of how can we create

more wetlands and manage the water more sustainably have a

more coordinated joined up approach so that it benefits

everybody and everything.

AJAY TEGALA: Yeah, that's something we're involved in at

Wicken Fen as well. And the importance of kind of holding

back that water to see us through the summer. And so

creating reservoirs is something we're doing in partnership with

some of the farmers as well.

LIZZIE BRUCE: Around here, the farmers really welcome the

swans. Some of the farmers say that if they're nibbling away on

the winter wheat, it actually makes it better the following

year. It kind of adds a bit more rigorous growth to the wheat.

So as long as the swans aren't trampling them when it's really

wet, yeah, the farmers are quite happy for swans out on their

winter wheat.

Locally what's really great is that we work really closely with

National Grid and UK Power and trying to fit deflectors to the

power lines. And this has been really successful, so they've

kind of evolved over time but they're basically just a small

plastic disc with reflectors on both sides that will just clip

onto the cables and this immediately makes such a big

difference to the swans they can immediately see them.

And once they're on those power lines, the swans instantly kind

of, we stop seeing those collisions.

AJAY TEGALA: I think that just highlights that to look after

species that migrate, it is about teamwork. It is about

working together and, yeah, different industries getting

involved to make a real difference.

LIZZIE BRUCE: A lot of birds are losing their wetlands. If we can

create more wetlands, more safe areas for them to roost and

feed. And then, yes, some of the other challenges such as power

lines. And, yeah, we can reverse some of the negativity. And as

you can see with whooper swans, their population is now

thriving.

AJAY TEGALA: The threats to the washes feel far away as we sit

drenched in sunlight looking at the expanse of blue, trimmed

with green edges. There are hundreds of chestnut-headed

pochard, a dozen pintails, ducks with needle-like tails, a

tumbling flock of lapwings and of course a familiar sight.

LIZZIE BRUCE: So we also have a few swans out here so we've got

mute swans and whooper swans. They're just drifting up and

down. At this time of day a lot of the swans have all gone off

into the fields to feed. But then we do a commentated swan

feed in the afternoons during the winter, at about half three,

and this is when we start.

We give the swans and the ducks a small amount of grain. It's a

little treat for them, and you'll start to see more swans

coming in. It's really magical just seeing them drift around,

and they'll come in closer to the hide, and it's really

special.

AJAY TEGALA: With sunset and the swan feed a few hours off, I'm

determined to use this time to search for Bewick's swans. And I

know that they're out there, somewhere in the fields that

stretch out in front of us. But our chances aren't good, as

there are only a very small number dotted across the Fens.

So we're just about a mile away from Welney, we've headed south,

and there's a field with about 200 swans. And I've just scanned

through with my telescope and they are all whooper swans.

They've all got that wedge of cheese rather than the knob of

butter. But there's definitely some juveniles, you can pick out

the greyer ones.

I guess it must be winter wheat, there's just the kind of green

shoots coming through, you've got the really black peaty soil

and then the lush green shoots coming through and they're just

kind of, well most of them are sat, some of them are waddling

around, but in the winter sun the green looks so bright and

then also the whiteness of the swans glowing in the sun.

Yeah it is a really distinctive call. I mean they sound just

like geese, they're kind of honking a little bit. So yeah,

very different to mute swans which don't say a lot and they

have that kind of high-pitched call when you do hear them.

Here it's this kind of deep grunty kind of hooping call that

gives them the name. But yeah, it is very goose-like. It's

funny because they look so elegant and beautiful and yet

they just sound a little bit less like they look I suppose.

But I love that sound, I absolutely adore it.

So we've been driving around quite a few miles on bumpy roads

and we were sort of beginning to give up hope and we've just

stumbled upon another field with another couple of hundred swans

in. We're on the kind of a remote farm track, very

windswept, on the side of a minor road and I'm just going to

scan across and see if we can pick out, fingers crossed, some

Bewick's.

I really, really want to see them. I really want to see them.

This happens a few more times. We spot a flock of white in the

distance.

Pick our way down increasingly narrow roads, then get out the

scope.

But each time, all that's in front of me are wedges of cheese

and hooping.

We've just spent a couple of hours literally driving all over

the fens, looking for Bewick's swans. We didn't see any, but

there's this gorgeous sunset. Everything's turning orange and

we're heading back to Welney for hopefully the highlight of the

day.

We return to Welney just in time for the dusk swan feed. Despite

hundreds of criss-crossing pochard ducks, there is just a

single whooper swan.

It floats gracefully, bending its neck to scoop up its nightly

treat. But afterwards, we take a stroll to the final hide. A

great white V shoots over our head, softly hooping through the

fading light.

There's not really much colour, just kind of greyness, but

silver to the water, on which there's lots of silhouetted

ducks. I can hear lots of widgeon whistling. Every now and

then a few whooper swans are dropping in and we're expecting

over the next few minutes more and more to come in to roost

here on this water for the night.

Leaving Welney I was sad not to see any Bewick's swans but it's

hardly surprising with so many challenges facing them.

I was starting to give up hope of seeing any Bewick's swans

this year. But on a frozen morning, I take one last trip to

Welney.

I'm in the Lyle Hide on Welney, and it's a few weeks after I

spent a whole day looking for Bewick's swans. And since then,

there's been this cold snap. There's a lot of frozen water on

the washes here. There's a few little areas that aren't frozen,

and that's where the swans are gravitating to. And as if by

magic, there's a distant group of about ten.

And I've just through a telescope been watching one and

literally it's had its head tucked into its wing for ages,

tantalising, but it looked a bit smaller. And eventually it

showed its head and I could see that just like it was described

the bill is mostly black with like a little knob of butter and

there it is, a Bewick's swan at last. After so much searching

it's so exciting to finally see a Bewick's swan. Wahey, even

though it's quite a long way away through a scope not visible

with the naked eye at all, hardly.

It's just really exciting to finally, finally see one and

worth heading out in the cold to witness.

There it is, there it is. Yes. Yes.

Thanks for listening to this episode of Wild Tales. To find

out more about Welney and the swan counts, you can go to our

show notes and join us on Instagram @wildtalesnt.

See you next time.