A guide to seeing the trumpeter swans at Riverlands

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The trumpeter swan (Cygnus buccinator) is the biggest native waterfowl in North America. These birds have angel-white feathers, black bills, long necks, and wings that stretch wider than a Humvee. They’re shielded from hunters by state and federal law and fly hundreds of miles south each winter to gather at Riverlands Migratory Bird Sanctuary (301 Riverlands Way, West Alton) by the WAMP-ing thousands. 

We’ve now entered the time of year when their numbers are highest, so it’s a good time to bundle up, grab your binoculars, and go check them out. 

Before piling in the car, though, it’s always best to call the Audubon Center at Riverlands at 636-899-0090 or check the center’s posts on Facebook for the latest.

WHEN TO GO

In general, the trumpeter swan population at Riverlands peaks from mid-December to mid-January. More than 2,000 have been spotted on a single day at the sanctuary. There’s a noticeable surge toward the end of their stay, right before they leave en masse to fly back north, but the timing of that surge is hard to predict, says the center’s executive director, Ken Buchholz.  

As for times of day: In the morning from dawn to about 9:30 is a great window in which to see them flap out of the water and heave away from the Mississippi toward nearby agricultural fields, where they gobble up leftover soybeans and corn. You can tell they’re about to get up off the water when they start bobbing their heads. Then they come back to Riverlands in the afternoon right when the sun is starting to set so that they can roost on the water. (At night, by the way, is when the gray-feathered youngsters, called cygnets, look for mates—no small decision, because trumpeters generally mate for life.)

WHERE TO FIND THEM

For reference, use this online map of Riverlands. 

Buccholz says a superb morning spot is the Teal Pond, which is at the western edge of the sanctuary. When you turn onto Riverlands Way from U.S. 67, it’s the first big pond you see on the right. Taking the first right, you come to a parking lot where you can see not only the Teal Pond but also some prairie marsh. 

A second spot to see them is in Ellis Bay. “When they’re out there in big numbers,” Buchholz says, “they look like little white sailboats all over the place.” If you’ve arrived early and the center is still closed—its hours are 8 a.m.–4 p.m. Tues.–Sun.—there are two pull-off lots on the north side of Riverlands Way after you pass the center. But if the center is open, Buchholz says, there’s no better place to view them on Ellis Bay. “We have the best spotting scopes, and you’re staying warm and can get other information.” 

Also, if you don’t see any, just keep your ears open. When trumpeter swans hang out together, they sound like a really terrible elementary-school brass band that’s warming up. 

SOME HISTORY

Swans have bewitched humans for millennia. They show up in Greek, Norse, and Celtic myths, though storytellers in those European traditions were referencing a distinct species: mute swans, Cygnus olor, which have orange bills with black knobs on top. Here in North America, the most numerous species of swan is actually the tundra swan, Cygnus columbianus, recognizable by the yellow teardrop on its black bill. Tundras migrate mainly between Alaska and the Western states (though some do make it to Riverlands). Their numbers are so robust that hunters can legally bag them in certain regions. 

The trumpeters are different. By the early 1900s, market hunting and wetlands drainage had nearly wiped them out in the Lower 48, but since then, they’ve received federal protection. Wildlife managers located a pocket of trumpeters in Alaska and reintroduced some to the Upper Midwest. That group of transplants flourished and grew. Then, in the winter of 1991, a pioneering few of them found their way, somehow, to the Riverlands sanctuary, which had recently been created by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. (The Corps now manages Riverlands with help from Audubon.) 

Those first trumpeters flew back north to hatch their eggs but returned in subsequent years with their cygnets, which eventually matured and brought down their offspring, such that nowadays wintering at Riverlands is an annual event.

WHY YOU SHOULD BOTHER

Buchholz says the trumpeters are a seasonal signal from the earth, and that trekking out to see them is a tradition in some families. “You know winter is on its way when you start seeing the trumpeter swans come,” he says. “They have this crazy sound when they’re all coming in for landing, and when they take off out on the bay, you can hear their feet paddling in the water, and it’s an 80-yard takeoff. They’re really elegant birds. And then you know they’re going to leave—you’re going to say goodbye to them. There are people that come up here every year to see the swans. It’s sort of a ritual.”