BRITAIN-ROYALS/SWANS Royal swans counted on the River Thames

Record ID: 149468

  • Title: BRITAIN-ROYALS/SWANS Royal swans counted on the River Thames
  • Date: 20th July 2015
  • Summary: BAND PLAYING, CELEBRATING SWAN UPPING
  • Embargoed: 4th August 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVAEFVGAJ4AQKN1MR5532X1H00SA
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: The annual census of the Queen's swans on the River Thames has taken place for the last 800 years.
    And on Monday (July 20) the colourful tradition, known as Swan Upping, continued strong, with the Queen's Swan Marker, dressed in a scarlet coat and swan feather in his hat, leading the wooden row boats up the river.
    "Swan Upping is the way of monitoring the welfare of the Thames swans. It dates right back to the twelfth century when swans then were eaten, they were an important food, but of course today it's all about conservation and education," the Queen's Swan Marker, David Barber, said.
    In medieval times swans were regarded as a delicious feast at banquets.
    No-one is allowed to kill swans now and they are not eaten.
    Technically the Queen can own all unmarked swans, but she only exercises that right in certain areas, Barber said.
    "The Crown has the right, the Queen let's say, has the royal prerogative to own any swan swimming in open waters, unmarked in the United Kingdom, if she so wishes. That doesn't mean she owns all of them. So she mainly exercises this right on the River Thames here," he said.
    In the fifteenth century the Crown shared ownership of the swans with the Worshipful Company of Vintners and the Worshipful Company of Dyers.
    Dressed in their traditional livery, the teams use six traditional Thames rowing skiffs, each flying their flags and pennants.
    It takes them five days to cover the stretch of the Thames between Sunbury near London out to Abingdon near Oxford.
    They count all the adult swans and tag and monitor the health of cygnets by weighing them and checking in their mouths.
    The river can be a dangerous place for the young swans, at risk from fishing hooks and wire.
    A serious decline in the swan population in the mid-1980s was reversed when lead fishing weights were replaced with a non-toxic substance.
    But growing demand for recreational use of the river has meant the river is still a dangerous habitat for the royal birds.
    Crowds gather along the route to watch the spectacle, as the birds and their young are carried flapping onto the shoreline.
    In England popular modern myth has it that a swan can break a man's arm, something Barber scoffed at.
    "Well…let people think that. No, no, they don't, but they have…you know, you are talking about a very large bird. You are talking up to 15 kilos, they have a wingspan of over two and a half metres and they are a very powerful bird. So when we take them out of the water, you have to hold them right and, you know, they do sort of….They are very strong," he said.
    Last year swan uppers counted around 1,200 adult swans. Amongst them were around 40 breeding pairs and markers ringed 120 new cygnets.
    Conservationists would rather that number be higher, but say the swans aren't in any immediate danger of disastrous population decline just yet.
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