I swear those swans will be the death of me!

Blooming 'eck how much more can one take! More drama yesterday when one of last years cygnets, fully grown but still harbouring those distinctive brown feathers, came up in some haste from below the lock. As stated in a previous post we have another family of Swans that patrol between Langley Bridge lock and Eastwood so the reason was very apparent why that youngster hightailed it up to here. Of course, it couldn't have known about our resident swans but it soon found out!

Jim and Jenn came to help, Jim with a broom to ward off the Cob and Jenn to try and stand guard. That Cob was determined to get to the interloper and nothing we could do would deter it from its mission. We watched in horror as the youngster was pinned against the fence and attacked unmercifully. A hole in the fence was its saving grace allowing it onto the street but now it was in danger of being hit by cars. Jim to the rescue by herding it back toward the gate and Jen stood by to stop it from going onto the road

 Sods Law said that a vehicle would turn into the drive and this is exactly what happened. That car owner, assessing the situation did no more than grab hold of the swan youngsters neck, place an arm around its body and began to carry it below the lock. OMG, we soon put him right about that but instead of just placing the youngster on the grass he did no more than release it into the water in the basin. This was the worst thing he could have done because it was still fully accessible to our resident swan family.

Big, big dilemma now. How to keep that youngster safe. An idea formed that maybe we could swing FS across from the boats to the bank cutting off the Cobs route to the youngster. In theory, this was sound except for one thing. This would mean we couldn't get on or off the boat! So another brainwave. How about using Pentland instead and I'm pleased to report this worked a treat. Slight flaw in the plan, the Cob could still see the youngster and was in a highly charged state of attack, swimming backwards and forwards continusly along Pentland's hull. The Cob even tried a run-up to take flight but there was not a long enough stretch of open water for it to lift off so as far as we were concerned the youngster would be safe enough staying trapped in the basin.

Trying to get hold of a wildlife rescue nearby was almost impossible. The only one we could make contact with was Linjoy in Burton-on-Trent and they couldn't get to us until today. First thing this morning I phoned again and although they would have come out later asked if we could try Brinsley wildlife rescue about a 10-minute drive away. They were only too happy to help but the biggest problem was how to get the youngster whilst it was still in the water so we offered the use of Pentland as a means of transport. Thankfully they came this afternoon and as luck would have it the youngster had got itself onto the bank of a private mooring, Jenn, Jim and I kept it on the bank whilst Ian kept a lookout for the rescuers to arrive. It all went like clockwork and we were told its release site was in a large wildlife wetland reserve which already had plenty of rescued swan youngsters. So alls well that ends well and so looking forward now to Monday when we can leave all the Langley Mill dramas behind.