Am I the only one that is bothered by seeing Elaine and Lancelot locked up in their small, albeit comfortably aerated, cage? Day after day and night after night I walk around campus and pass by the Trumpeters on my way to class or another highly nutritious meal at Burger King. And day after day and night after night those majestic birds play follow-the-leader, or tag, or just seem to sleep a lot. In north Iowa, where I hail from, people tend to sleep more in the late winter too, usually from a syndrome called “cabin fever,” a psuedohibernation state.

After a brief period of liberty that followed an “orientation phase,” the swans lived out their nature and turned the ISU campus into their own private sanctuary, and to hell with the traffic and pedestrians! I know because I was attacked once when I impinged too closely to their “sleeping end” of the lake. Anyway, the unfortunate swans were denied their territorial nature by the powers that be and were consigned once more to that little cage on the west end of the lake.

Seeing anything in a cage really bothers me, unless it’s an out-of-control professor who keeps insisting on 8 a.m. classes! The idea of a great bird in a cage seems particularly distasteful but now we have two right where we see or hear them every day. Now while I like the sound of the trumpeting, especially at night, I can’t help but wonder what the newest versions of Lancelot and Elaine are saying to each other.

“Hey Lance.”

“Hey Elaine.”

“Is today the day that we get out?”

“I don’t know but I sure hope so. This ISU food service is really starting to get to me, haven’t they ever heard of variety in Ames? I’m also getting kind of dizzy from swimming all these endless laps, and I can’t help but wonder what the world looks like without all of these old wooden fence slats obstructing my sight!”

“Yeah. They kind of make you think of jail bars, don’t they?”

“Yeah. And 5 million iterations of tag and follow-the-leader is starting to make me want to trumpet all the time! Whoever would of thought we’d be spending the prime of our life on a place called Lake Latrine?”

“Well, have a nice day Lance. I’m going to take a nap.”

“You too, Elaine. See ya!”

I think that we should either release the Trumpeters back into the lake in the Spring for good, or just call it quits now and release them into the wild. It could even be a media event. I’ll bet if someone called Bill Clinton about this idea he would even show up in person for the releasing!

He can use all the good press he can get these days. If they stick around, great, if not…well, at least they’ll be much happier and doing that natural thing. Wasn’t that the idea of the trumpeter swan program in the first place — to reintroduce them into the wild wetlands again? Maybe it was a mistake to try to contain them to a campus lake. Being trendy is one thing, but being persistently cruel is quite another! Maybe it’s the close proximity of all the humans that is getting them down and increasing their aggressiveness.

Whatever!!! In my opinion, they should be released either way, and soon! How would you like to be locked up in a goofy-looking cage all the time and watched closely to see if you will breed successfully or not? OK, let me rephrase that, since some of you probably think that’s a good idea! Hmmm. How about —give those wonderful creatures what Americans are supposed to revere, almost worship — FREEDOM!!!!

Michael Tefft

Senior

Anthropology