It is believed that a mute swan sings a beautiful song once in its lifetime, just before it dies. Fifty-five mute swans in South Jersey didn’t have the chance for a swan song, as they probably didn’t see the bullet coming.
The N.J. Division of Fish and Wildlife is responsible for a mass kill of the quiet birds in Mannington Township, with the purpose of thinning the swan population and sampling the species for avian flu, reports Today’s Sunbeam.
Salem County residents claim that hunters have been driving around in pickup trucks overflowing with the bird carcasses and Mannington Township Mayor Ernest Tark Jr. said that it was disturbing that swans were killed in residents’ backyards with no warning.
"They just came in and did it," Tark said Friday. "A lot of people come down to see the swans, and they are in a lot of the county's tourism materials. Now just like that, they are gone."
Division Assistant for Fish and Wildlife Larry Herrighty told Today’s Sunbeam that the swans were shot because of ecological health issues and human safety. None of the blood samples from the bird corpses tested positive for avian flu, according to Herrighty. There has never been a human case of avian flu in the U.S.
The swans, which can weigh up to 25 pounds, eat eight pounds of water vegetation a day. This does not bode well for other water birds and animals that eat the same soggy fare.
Native to Europe and Asia, the mute swan was introduced into the U.S. in the late 1800s but is still not naturalized into North America. The population in New Jersey has increased from 530 in 1986 to about 1,250 in 2008. But the overall population in the Atlantic Flyway, from Florida to Ontario, has decreased by almost 4,000 in the past six years.
