Mississippi River Swans

Thanks to the Mississippi River town of Monticello, trumpeter swans are fat, sassy and abundant in Minnesota.

All it took was 35 years of providing a virtual Club Med to the swans, the largest water Bird in North America.

There were only a few living in Minnesota in 1986, when Sheila Lawrence started feeding waterfowl in the back yard of her riverside Monticello home.

The swans appreciated the daily all-you-can-eat spread of dried corn, and also the balmy waters from the nuclear power-generating plant upstream.

More came, and eventually, as many as 3,000 trumpeter swans were bellying up to her buffet each morning, consuming 1,600 to 2,000 pounds of corn, with a little help from ducks and geese. The feedings became a show that drew spectators from near and far. In the morning, the big Birds would begin to arrive at the Lawrence house, feet skimming the water as they glided to a landing on outspread wings of 7 to 8 feet.

Sticking close to kin, they turned the shoreline into a raucous playground, blustering, showing off and squabbling over insults, real or imagined.

The noise could be heard from the street as a buzz, like a nest of angry hornets. From the river's edge, it was cacophony, a high-pitched tumult of honks, squawks and screeches.

When Sheila Lawrence died in 2011, her husband Jim took over, feeding the swans from mid-November through February.

But by 2020, trumpeter swans were well established in Minnesota, and the feedings could stop. Now, the swans are on their own.