Charlotte Bezzant is a jewellery designer and maker who lives in South-West London. Charlotte’s garden is home to a pair of Mute Swans – aptly named Mama and Daddy Swan. They often pop indoors for a nose about!
Charlottes’ garden backs on to the Longford River in Hampton Hill. The Longford River, which was constructed in 1638/39 is about 12 miles long and was dug in an astonishingly quick 9 months. It was originally commissioned by King Charles I to bring fresh water to Hampton Court Palace, and to this day it still supplies the fountains and ponds of the Royal Parks and Hampton Court Palace. The Longford River at the rear of Charlotte’s garden is a narrow, winding path of water, which in the summer is over-hung by willows, with children kayaking - this is the territory of Mama and Daddy swan.
Charlotte remembers fondly their arrival, “The swans first arrived in my garden in 2018. It was a surprising day as I looked out the window and mama swan had laid an egg in the border. It seemed to have caught her completely by surprise. They had no nest and built one around it. The first year wasn’t successful because of the fox, but in the second year, as soon as the cygnets could manage it, mama swan paraded them to my back door, it was like she had brought them to me to show me. Truly heart-warming. Each year as soon as they can manage it at just a couple of days old, she does the same thing.” The Swans have returned every year, and Charlotte is hoping they’ll return for a fifth year very soon.
I asked if she enjoyed having the swans in her garden – and whether they made a mess! She replied, “It feels a complete privilege that they picked my garden to nest in, and I love sharing it with them. I have been offered a unique insight into their lives. To have the trust of such large and beautiful creatures is something I never take for granted.”
And the mess… “One question people always ask me is about the poo. When they are nesting, they rarely poo in the garden, retreating to the river for such things. When the garden is full of toddlers/cygnets it’s a different story and never going in the garden with bare feet seems an OK price to pay for the joy of having them in my garden. There have been no indoor accidents!” Not many people have swans wandering into their lounge, but this is quite common at Charlotte’s house. “I share my house with a cat called Bertie, and my garden with two chickens who often free range. Bertie knows his place with the swans. He generally doesn’t bat an eyelid, and I have no concerns about him and the cygnets. An adult swan can see off a fox, so they would soon sort Bertie, and two weeks in the cygnets are as big as ducks. The chickens seem slightly oblivious. The adult swans will hiss and nip if any of the three accidentally stray too close. Each year it seems the cygnets consider the house just an extension of the garden and they often wander indoors.” To start with, Charlotte didn’t feed the swans, “I had strong feelings it was interfering with nature. Over the years, I have relaxed my view on this, and normally have some ’floating marine duck food’ handy which they love. Swans also love to eat things like grain, peas, shredded lettuce.”
I thought it must be a huge responsibility to have these huge creatures nesting in your garden and wondered if she worried about the swans and their eggs. “Yes, I feel very responsible, so much so. The first year the fox came and ate the first cygnet to hatch and stole the remaining four eggs, so each year I do two weeks of ‘Fox Watch’ where I sleep on the sofa or in my garden room waking several times a night to help scare the Fox away when I hear the swans hissing.” While Charlotte seems to be seen as a totally trusted human by Mama and Daddy swan, and the cygnets each year. There is one special cygnet that stole Charlotte’s heart. “In 2019, all the eggs hatched but one. Parents take the hatched cygnets for their first swim 24-hours after they hatch. Off they went leaving one lone egg with a crack in it. Frantically waving my arms, I got mama swan back from her swim and she hatched the last egg, only to leave the poor cygnet, as the pull of the rest of her brood was too much. Alone in the nest it was being eyed greedily by a crow and on the spur of the moment I grabbed the cygnet and stuffed it down my top to keep it warm. It spent the day there before being snuck successfully back in the nest that night. It turned out that he bonded with me, and he used to walk right into my studio calling for me. I named him Norty.”
The swans never scare or frighten her, though they are not quite so relaxed with strangers. There is considerable concern about whether they will nest in her garden this year, “For the first time, there is anxiety about 2022 nest building. Hopefully it will start any day, but devastatingly the area has just been subjected to some severe vegetation clearance by some over-zealous contractors, and there are concerns that the swans may pick somewhere new this year.” Charlotte can’t thank Swan Support enough. They’ve been out a couple of times to help when she’s had swans or cygnets in need. One year an adult swan needed catching as it was caught in discarded fishing gear, a hook in its beak, and line wrapped round its wings; and last year they took a cygnet with a malformed foot, created a splint for the foot so it corrected and the completely rehabilitated the swan could be released back into the wild. You can follow Charlotte and the 2022 swan story (should it happen) on Twitter or Instagram. More information on the River Longford can be found here.
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