Trumpeter Swan

Low bugles bloom into an accented ah-OH, with a few phrases stretching to ah-oh-LOO.

Breeds mainly in Alaska, western and central Canada, the northern Rocky Mountains, and parts of the upper Midwest. Winters along the Pacific Northwest coast, the interior Northwest, and ice-free river systems and reservoirs in the central United States.

Large, shallow freshwater habitats including ponds, marshes, slow rivers, and lake margins with abundant emergent and submerged aquatic vegetation.

Arrives on breeding grounds soon after ice-out in spring; nests April–June; broods fledge by late summer; migrates south as waters freeze, generally October–November; returns north February–April, following open leads in rivers and wetlands.

The Trumpeter Swan is North America’s heaviest native flying bird. Pure white as an adult, with an impressively long neck and a straight, black bill that meets the eye, it exudes elegance as it glides across water bodies. Once driven to near-extirpation, reintroduction efforts have restored many populations, and its loud, resonant honks now trumpet across northern wetlands again.