Mute Swan - 1894

Cygnus olor

Introduced.

The chief station in the county of these beautiful birds is at Stackpole Court, where a number frequent the romantic lake in the park in what may be considered a wild state. The lake winds about in a serpentine shape, its banks, at places, bordered by finely timbered woods, and at one part, on the side towards the sea, by a warren. At its extremity towards the sea a narrow range of sandhills separates it from the shore. The Swans come and go as they like, and are most numerous during the summer, when there are nearly a hundred on the lake, many pairs being engaged in nesting.

In the autumn, when the weeds die down beyond their reach, and the water is high, most of the Swans disappear, and in the middle of winter, not more than eight or ten will be found remaining. A few of the birds visit the Milford Haven creeks, and one is occasionally shot on the neighbouring marshes, but the majority evidently leave the county altogether, and probably migrate far to the south. The few Mute Swans that occasionally appear on the estuary of Taw and Torridge, in North Devon, may be stragglers from the Stackpole flock.

The Swans all return again to their Pembrokeshire home in the spring. Lord Cawdor informed us that he never introduced any fresh blood, and that the number of Swans varied with the abundance of the American weed, that, after twenty-five years, had begun to diminish, and had almost died out in some parts of the water.

Mathew M.A. 1894, Birds of Pembrokeshire and it's Islands