Luxor4u

I had heard the expression many times but had to look it up to see exactly what it meant.

Spoiler

the practice in England of marking young swans with a notch in the upper beak as a sign of ownership

I love all the photo's but agree you do need good weather for Abbotsbury. We used to go virtually every year, especially when the kids were young, and later combined it with the Abbotsbury Tropical Gardens which are lovely. The gardens do wonderful candle lit winter wonderland evenings as well

Here's 1 I took in June thisyear on the Broads (any shake is hands trembling from the cold )

A view looking down on Abottsbury Swannery from the Sub-Tropical
Gardens


A couple of images from the illuminated gardens

Bamboo


Ferns


That was four years ago...how time flies. I don't think we will ever be there again at that time of year.

Lovely pictures Fran & Barry thanks for sharing
The candle lit winter wonderland evening sounds really nice were the illuminated pictures taken then?
And yes you are correct about Swan Upping, but don't tell Bennu

Tony, from what I remember she owns all of them! not just along the Thames, greedy devil

Great swan pictures by all

Love your pics Fran & barry

Yes Horus, my pictures are dated 3rd November 2006. The gardens are lit by candle lamps and by carefully placed coloured spots. The tea rooms do a roaring trade in the evening as well. By but it was a cold evening but I guess that made it more magical as everyone was wrapped up in thick coats. The long view of the swannery was taken at around 4 in the afternoon so the light was just fading. It had been a lovely bright, clear cold day.

Love all the photos! The swans are beautiful.

I think black swans are stunning & had some lovely photo's of a pair doing a mating display, sadly that was a printed photo & didn't make the journey
So if anyone has one I would love to see it?

Sorry Fran, I have no black swans to post, but here is another couple of Mute swans from my collection

Male Swan


And seen here chasing off the opposition.

Those are lovely, I guess you could photo shop them black (just kidding) We regularly saw them at Marwell & they produced 5 babies after all that courting so we watched them grow up

This pair have managed to raise all five signets this year, last year a mink had a couple of them when they were quite small. These are already flying on occasion, so hopefully they will all survive into next year.

They look good & strong, hopefully your flock/herd/bevy will grow year by year

Had to look up collective of swans after putting flock. Wedge is when they are flying

My contribution to the "swan" category.......They're pretty birds.




Awwwwww geeezzzzzzzzz - As always my photos are not publishing :cc ....lately this is making me too disheartened to keep up with all the effort to try and get a photo on here. Wish I knew 'why' 75% of the time I can't get a picture to come out.........Anyway - my swan (or swan song of today)

Mod edit:- Sorted

No idea why you had a problem, maybe you picked up a hidden space or something
That is beautiful & part way to black

Nice picture LLL don't give up on trying to post your pictures, as Fran says you are probably just making some small error with the code.

Beautiful creatures, and how do they keep their feathers SO white.

This cob was pecking grass at the edge of the pond yesterday and was unperturbed when I got up close for this uncropped portrait.

Lovely close up Grandad :

I simply copied the code & pasted it when I edited it LLL, nothing different from what you did I'm sure. When I did one of mine before I got a blank & when I checked there there was a space in with the highlighted bit

Nice close-up Grandad
I was doing the same as you only last week I was feeding some Swans on a stretch of canal and trying to get some close ups of the Mallard ducks, here is an un-cropped one that I took of a Swan and another of a male Mallard duck. The Swan was not to keen on my dog being so close and even though he would not chase them, he still came in for a hiss and an attempted peck.



I called this one Donald

Great close ups from you folks I might go walkies tomorrow & get some swan pics.

How do you know a female from male ??

Kiya wrote:Great close ups from you folks I might go walkies tomorrow & get some swan pics.

How do you know a female from male ??

I agree about the photo's and for the second part

Spoiler

the female lays the eggs

Sorry

@ Fran

Kiya wrote:

How do you know a female from male ??

Look at the bump just above the beak and just above the nostril holes, in a male the bump is more pronounced than the female. The Swans will almost certainly still be together as a pair so it is unlikely that you will see either two males or two females together. However if there are say five to six all white Swans together they may be a fully fledged brood just prior to separating, if that is the case you will still see a tendancy for the signets to follow the female as she swims, otherwise any grey looking Swans are this years signets.
Hope that you have a good days photography