An Aurora swan suffering from angel wing syndrome has been safely captured and brought to a wildlife refuge.
Donna Lewis, a board member of Trumpeter Swan Conservation Ontario, successfully caught the swan on the fifth attempt at the Aurora Community Arboretum on Wednesday morning, “without any injury to either of us.”
“The parents called, they flapped their wings, but they did not make a big fuss at all, which is good because it means I did not cause as much trauma as I thought I might,” said Lewis.
“But they were quite good about it, which I was a bit surprised by. But it could be that they already realized there may be a problem with that cygnet.”
Lewis had tried previously on four times to try and safely capture the young swan. She took the swan to Shades of Hope in Pefferlaw, a wildlife refuge where injured animals are rehabilitated.
Lewis said the swan’s wing could be bound, and hopefully reset. Angel wing syndrome is rarely curable in young cygnets, and incurable in adult birds.
The swan had developed the condition likely because of being overfed by humans. Angel wing syndrome is a condition that twists the last joint of the bird's wing, making the flight feathers point outwards, which prevents the swan from flying. Other waterfowl like geese and ducks can also suffer from the condition.
“I think part of the problem is anyone who does feed the swans think that they’re the only one doing it. ‘Oh, it’s just a little bit, it won’t hurt.’ The problem is it’s 50, 60, 100 different people all thinking, ‘Oh just a little bit won’t hurt.’ But unfortunately it did.”
The condition can be a “death sentence,” Lewis said in a previous interview.
But Lewis did encourage residents to come to the arboretum to see the other swans in the coming week, as she expected they would be learning to fly.
