Jameson Champion
Each year since 1980, the City of Lakeland has held a ‘Swan Roundup’ at Lake Morton.
Next week on Oct. 6 and 7 at 7 a.m., the city will be holding its 40th Annual Swan Roundup, where they corral the swans on Lake Morton in order to perform medical checkups on the animals. This year is different, however, as the event is also being used to prepare for the sale of some of the swans.
“It is very important that our Lakeland flock is doing well so we schedule the Swan Roundup each year with the primary purpose to check on the health of our birds,” Bob Donahay said in a City of Lakeland news posting about the event.
According to an article by the Lakeland Ledger, the sale is due to overpopulation of Lake Morton.
Lake Morton can only support up to 50 Swans, whereas the current amount of swans numbers around 90 according to the City of Lakeland.
It takes a total of two days to finish the roundup.The first part of the roundup involves taking boats out onto Lake Morton and corralling the swans with nets. On the second day, a veterinarian is brought to perform a medical checkup on the swans.
After the medical checkups, they will sort the swans to be sold away from the ones that will remain at Lake Morton.
The city states that they have a long list of buyers for the swans. This is not the first time they have sold Lake Morton’s swans. In 2011 the city had sold Lake Morton’s swans for the same reason. No information has yet been given on a date for the sale of the birds.
