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Why hundreds of loud swans are flocking to Madison’s lakes

Each November and December, two swan species pass through Madison during their fall migration from the Alaskan and Canadian Arctic to Chesapeake Bay and the mid-Atlantic Coast. The length of their stay on Lake Mendota and Lake Monona depends on weather conditions and can range from days to weeks, according to Stanley Temple, the Beers-Bascom Professor Emeritus in Conservation at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.