It is a winter habitation option that few would hesitate over: the Siberian tundra or the glorious Gloucestershire wetlands. But flocks of Bewick’s swans appear to have plumped for the former, prompting fears that their great migration might never be seen again. Concerns have been raised by the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust centre at Slimbridge where hundreds of the swans would normally have arrived and be settling for the winter months after a summer in Siberia. None has been sighted, leading conservationists to suggest that climate change has made the Arctic so warm that they are happy to stay put. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) said that if temperatures continued to rise the birds might lose their ‘collective memory’ of their winter home, denying Britain’s birdwatchers one of the year’s most impressive sights. About 8,100 swans usually winter in Britain. The majority, about 6,000, go to East Anglia, about 300 head for Slimbridge and others are seen on the Severn estuary, the Nene Washes, Cambridgeshire, and Martin Mere in Lancashire. The swans were due at Slimbridge on October 21, although they have been late before. In 1969 they did not return until […]