You Cant Always Get What You Want

We had a frustrating day today going to Broadway to buy spare stuff for the Motorhome which is no longer made, then to Worcester for a new widget for the Strimmer which doesn't have the bit on it which had gone wrong, and then going to find a shop which had closed down.

In Worcester we spotted all the swans on the river chasing over towards a man on the far bank who had arrived to feed them, so we went over to take a few pictures. We got talking to the man, who had two huge sacks of bread to give the swans who were gobbling it up as though it were going out of fashion. As the supplies started to dwindle they started quarreling over every last crumb. Safe to say they were clearly enjoying it.

He goes every day and feeds them, knows them quite well and could identify different birds by sight, and knew some of the numbers on their legs. LooseCanon asked if all the bread was harmful to them and he said that it wasn't, but sometimes he gives them grain as well.

In this photo top middle, you can see a swan with a deformed wing. There were a couple of them with this condition. This man told us that it was a genetic defect and didn't harm them in any way as they could still paddle around in the water. He said it was called 'Angel Wing'

Anyway the interesting bit of all this is that I came home and looked up this condition, and several articles suggest that it is a developmental problem, largely occurs in flocks of water birds which are fed by humans, and is probably due to dietary deficiency particularly when fed large amounts of white bread!