(Columbia, N.C.) Picture a fallow cornfield or shallow lake this time of year. Now picture them covered with large, white birds moving about as they feed. Or maybe they are just sleeping peacefully on the water. Each year, thousands of tundra swans migrate to winter refuges in eastern North Carolina. I just returned from a birding trip to the Outer Banks. The swans were a sight to behold. Tundra, or whistling, swans are large, almost 5 feet from head to tail, have a 5½-foot wingspan and weigh more than 20 pounds. They breed on the Canadian tundra, thus their name, but in winter they seek unfrozen habitat along both coasts of the United States. Two places they like are Lake Mattamuskeet National Wildlife Refuge and Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge near Columbia.
>> Read More
