I fear this wild swan is a victim of the drought. The Laguna de San Antonio aka Laguna Lake!) in Chileno Valley, in both West Marin, and Sonoma County, has completely evaporated. A first. Technically the laguna is a very large vernal pool, the largest in California, but this is the first time I’ve seen it bone dry. See that swan’s big black foot? It was always suspended above the water line. S/he was constantly grooming under that protruding foot, it stuck out like a small black sail. I’ve observed this particular bird for hours. It could not put that leg down, and the wing too was permanently canted up. That said, it could chug along pretty well on one leg. With only one functional leg, s/he managed fine in this part of the laguna, but never migrated to the other side of the lake with the other swans, or to the Arctic either. No idea if it’s a he or a she—we like to assign gender to things perhaps to personalize our experience—but it never had a mate or any babies. It usually swam alone, apart from the flock. I’m not even sure if it’s a mute swan or a tundra swan. There are both found in the laguna. After hauling out the old photos to post here, I can see it’s a mute swan—an invasive species. Am I supposed to suddenly hate it because it’s not native? But I have unconsciously named it. Its beak is somewhere in between the two species. Tundra swans have yellow embedded on their beaks, this one has scarlet on its beak. Maybe that’s why it doesn’t commute. It doesn’t know where to go. Besides, it probably has been anchored to this spot of the lakebed for so long, it has lost the urge. Mute attestation. I thought maybe that fishing line filament caught up on its leg, but I never could get close enough to see. I thought about calling a wildlife rescue for it, but it seemed to be managing OK. Besides, can you imagine trying to wrestle a swan? I’m no Leda. Now, the laguna is only a mudflat, the lake is gone—and on the opposite shore, I saw what looked like a dead swan. A one-legged swan, stuck in the mud, sans lake, wouldn’t stand a chance of survival. I’d have to seriously trespass across the mudflats in order to cross the lakebed in order to verify it. I wasn’t quite brave enough yesterday. I did walk a third of the way across the lakebed. Yesterday, I found the tip of an old yellow fishing rod in the mud right about where this photo was taken. I imagined a scenario that the swan was anchored to that same spot via that fishing pole. It grew used to its confinement. Maybe that’s why it didn’t join the others when it eventually broke free. It couldn’t. Someone said the leg looks dislocated. Perhaps the bird eventually broke free of its mooring—perhaps dislocating its leg in the process. A one-legged swan, stuck in the mud, sans lake, wouldn’t stand a chance of survival. There used to be a lot of fish in the laguna. Bass, catfish, sunfish. Michael from Petaluma stopped to talk, and told me fishing stories of his youth. The one that got away. How he threw them all back. No fish now. Only the memory of fish. There are several new Turtle Crossing signs. At least the western pond turtles can burrow in the mud and hibernate. Can catfish hibernate too? I didn’t see any fish carcasses in the desiccated and cracked mud. But then I wasn’t looking for them. I could see on the far shore, a dead bird and it looks like a swan just by its girth—whether it’s that swan in question, I have no idea. As I stood in the middle of the lakebed, a white feather came tumbling toward my feet on the breeze. Perhaps a parting gift. And yet I mourn its loss.
