On being an invasive species

Yesterday I counted 22 swans off our dock, mostly adults along with a few young’uns. (This is a saltwater bay, and when the weather warms up the swans will fly off to various freshwater ponds, whose taste they prefer.) Which reminded me that, over the past year or two, people have been venting to us about the swans. It seems we’re not supposed to like them because they’re not indigenous—they’re invasive species. (A few years ago, we were in Scotland, where the authorities were tearing up and poisoning whole hillsides of rhododendron because neither were they indigenous.)

But here’s the thing: we’re not indigenous either. Plus we build docks on the water’s edge, and houses a bit farther back, and driveways out to the asphalt roads that lead to town. What swan has ever done anything on that scale? Blue skies! – Dan Ford