(Spirit Lake)– Efforts to reintroduce trumpeter swans to the Iowa Great Lakes have suffered a setback.
Gary Owen, a D-N-R enforcement officer, says a male trumpeter swan was hit by a car late Thursday afternoon near Buffalo Run on the west side of Big Spirit Lake. Owen says the swan suffered extensive injuries and was taken to Linda Hinshaw of Orphaned and Injured Wildlife. Owen says the swan is not expected to make it. Even if it does, he says it will probably be crippled for life.
Owen says they have strong reason to believe the swan, which is banded, had established territory and was nesting.
