This photo came to mind tonight as mothers day comes to a close.We were walking around the lake and weren’t the only ones to notice this particular swan and her cygnet. There’s usually a weekend crowd that congregates with bread around the Fairview Park lake which surprisingly, estate management tend to turn a blind eye to. This particular weekend, there was also a huge net that was hoisted in the middle along the width of the lake for maintenance and quite a bit of rubbish was caught in it. The mother swan watched closely as the cygnet interacted with the bits and bobs in the water. Whenever she came across something potentially harmful like a cellophane bread bag or a leaf she would drag it out of the way, but only after the cygnet had a curious peck at it. She batted the more daring Koi out of the way, and snapped at any unsuspecting terrapins that came in for their share of the loot. She, or to be fair, it could have been a he – did this repeatedly as the the cygnet went for the same floating debris; fighting water, other animals and the gaggle of humans that kept attracting its young with more strips of bread. She watched, waited and asserted herself when she needed to and did it all from the backseat (so to speak.) Thanks for the lesson, mama swan.

To you, and to mama’s everywhere.