This is a heartwarming episode that dives into the incredible work being done at the Swan Sanctuary over on Felix Lane, where the love for these majestic birds flows as freely as the water in their lakes. We meet Mel and Gemma Nelson, a mother-daughter duo carrying on the legacy of Mel's late mother, Dot Beeson, who started this sanctuary over 40 years ago in her back garden. We chat about the ups and downs of rescuing swans, from dealing with fishing tackle emergencies to performing surgeries in what might be the country’s only swan-specific operating theatre. And let me tell you, it takes a village - or in this case, a community - because we also hear about the generous spirit of Shepperton, where people are stepping up to support the sanctuary in big ways, like one lady who spent over a thousand pounds on their Amazon wish list! So grab a coffee, settle in, and get ready for some delightful stories and insights into the world of swan rescue.

Takeaways:

• The Swan Sanctuary is a family-run charity that has been rescuing swans since the 1980s, highlighting the community's dedication to wildlife care.
• Generosity shines bright in Shepperton, as evidenced by a lady who spent over a thousand pounds on the sanctuary's wish list, showing how much people care.
• Swans have a unique anatomy; their bones are hollow, which can complicate injuries, making their rescue and rehabilitation quite a challenge.
• The sanctuary operates a fully equipped veterinary theatre specifically for swans, making it possibly the only one of its kind in the country.
• Volunteers at the sanctuary are driven by passion and a commitment to helping wildlife, focusing solely on the birds without getting caught up in politics.
• If you encounter a swan in distress, the sanctuary encourages you to call them directly to get the best help possible.

• The Swan Sanctuary - Dedicated to the Care of Swans and Waterfowl
• The Swan Sanctuary Amazon Wishlist

Produced by Gareth Davies at The Sound Boutique

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That's Gemma Nelson talking about just one example of how generous Shepperton and the wider community can be towards the Swan Sanctuary.

And once you hear this episode, you'll understand why. Welcome to the Sheppertonian. I'm Gareth and this is the podcast that brings you stories, voices and events from in and around Shepperton.

Before we get into it, a thank you to the Sheppertonian Business Club, partners and members who make production possible. The Ferry Coffee Shop: purveyors of fine coffee, tea and snacks.

Meon Media, small business support based here in Shepperton, offering flexible support to keep things running smoothly in your business. The Sound Boutique: thoughtful audio for every story. And our business members, Island Motors: Shepperton based family run MOT servicing and repairs.

And LuvBiltong. A better for you snack. Whole protein with real flavour. And if you missed it, both of our live episodes are now up.

Dik Gregory on the Shepperton Village Fair and Farrah Charles and Dan Burton from Shepperton Studios talking about its 95th year. Well worth checking out. Head to thesheppertonian.uk/podcast to have a listen. In this episode, I went to Felix Lane to see the Swan Sanctuary.

I sat down with Mel Nelson and her daughter Gemma. Three generations of one family have now devoted themselves to this place.

They showed me around and what follows is a conversation about swans, about cruelty, about an operating theatre most vets would recognise, and about a family carrying forward something much bigger than any of them. I started by asking what a typical day actually looks like.

A proper day would start with feeding and cleaning everybody we've got attending to any emergency that's really won't wait. But then stacking it up as we go. Like, we know today that we've got the black swan at Shepperton Lock.

Somebody very kindly took the line off him, but they left the hook in. So now he's very skittish. We can't catch him, but he's got a great big hook in his neck. So we.

They know that they've got to do that when they come back from this other thing in London. And then we do all the feeding again late afternoon to keep them going overnight, make sure everybody's had their medications.

On top of that, the phone never really stops.

We cover all the way into London and sort of a little bit further up, but our phone calls come from all over the country. So we help direct people to closer rescues for them and sort of help people cause it's not very easy for people to find where they need.

There's a brilliant website called helpwildlife.co.uk that will help you find a wildlife rescue near you. But yeah, so we field calls for all sorts of emergencies all over the country.

Other rescues use them too, particularly when a case is beyond what they can manage.

We get lots of people that are redirected to us or indeed other centres use us because we've just got the space and they haven't. If, if it's just a little sort of rescue, they can't take things long term. Unlike rearing ducklings. You can see how much space they take up.

You can, you know, you've only got over weeks worth of ducklings and you're overrun if you're only a small rescue referral for big cases for swans.

So a lot of people can do sort of quick in and out rest and recuperation but if it needs surgery or long term treatment then it's referred here and we take them on.

The sanctuary's story starts with Mel's mother, Dot Beeson.

So Mum was always very... the neighbours used to bring in. I've got a little catted bird thing. So she used to take a lot of that sort of thing.

And then one year we had a gravel pit near where we lived and the swan was injured and we had to find help for it, which she did. There was a swan charity at the time which later folded and we just kind of picked up the pieces and kept going.

So we started at our house in Egham and then we had the site in Egham that was allotment land that wasn't used. And then we came here and we bought this bit.

Finding this site, 6 acres at Felix Lane with a lake connected to the Thames, took years.

Obviously took quite some years, particularly finding this site because we knew we wanted something with water and we wanted plenty of space and we wanted to own it. So we didn't, didn't have to worry about having to leave or you know, people planning, whatever. We just wanted a permanent home.

That's what that was Mum's dream. And she was very pleased once we'd got in here.

And even now the place keeps changing shape.

Well, I mean it's still evolving but it's taken a long time to get things exactly as we need them. You know, things change and you're like, actually we don't do that. Anymore. We want to do this bit. I mean, it's constantly on the refurb.

It's like the Forth Bridge, because it does get heavily used and different things come up that we need to be able to accommodate. And just volume, of course, ducklings, you can see how many we've got.

And maybe originally we maybe thought we were going mad at doing 30 ducklings in a year, where we wouldn't blink at 300 now, you know, it's usually way more than that.

I was with her right at the beginning with Steve, and once the charity was created and there was my husband and the trustees that we've got now were all in at the beginning. And that's what, 35 years ago the charity was formed. But we'd been working for a while before that.

But that was just, you know, hers and our collective idea that we wanted to do the best.

There was so much awful things happening to swans and water birds and somebody needed to correct that, you know, and the aim is to pick them up, sort out whatever it is that's gone wrong in their lives, whether we've caused it or whether some horrible accident or whatever, to get them back to their life and get on with it. Not to interfere or not do the right thing, but just to resolve something that was wrong.

I asked what carrying that forward means to Gemma.

It's very much making her proud. I know she was exceptionally proud of all of us. Oh, God, yeah. Quite frequently.

My big strong girls, big strong girls.

All the time, that.

And she was very proud that it was women. I mean, we are mostly women orientated. A lot of our rescuers are women. Yeah. Most of our staff are women.

And as I mentioned, it's now a third generation in.

She was made to bits when my daughter was born and then when she was able to walk, wanted to help, like from, you know, there are photos of her toddling about behind my nan, helping and, you know, feeding the birds and all that kind of stuff. Yeah, she very much wanted everybody to see what was going on. I think that's the thing, raising awareness for it.

She wanted people to see what awful things were going on because lots of people just didn't know and to a certain extent, they still don't. People are like, oh, my God, that happens. Yeah, all the time.

Fishing tackle is a big issue sort of in sort of ponds and that. Not necessarily from the fishermen even. No, because a lot like, a lot of the reports we get come from fishermen. They're like, oh, I'm here.

This one's tangled up in line. It all comes down to those that aren't following the rules. So, you know, tackle left, abandoned, that kind of stuff. So we get a lot of that.

There's a lot of catapulting going on.

At the minute and then there's what they do to each other and to.

Themselves this time of year.

They're very aggressive and they're all got an opinion and they're perfectly capable of killing each other or somebody else or somebody else's children.

Chasing, chasing everybody off in the weather at the minute that is so changeable. They don't like particularly flying in high winds, but if they're chased off, they will.

Which nine times out of 10, leads them to just falling out of the sky. They go, I don't want to fly anymore. And then they just come down wherever they are.

Walton Bridge, it turns out, is something of a known hazard.

The bridge is that colour so that you can see it against the grey sky.

But of course, you know when your head is 2 foot, 3 foot away from your body, so you're turning circle and your eyeballs are on the side of your head, you've got to turn your head and still go forward before you realise you've hit something. So they're not fabulous. I mean, they're good at flying as long as there's nothing in the way.

Yeah.

The sanctuary has its own operating theatre, possibly the only swan specific one in the country.

So we are a registered veterinary practice.

Yes, it's just a regular operating theatre. Any surgeon or veterinary surgeon would recognise all the bits and pieces.

And it just means that they can come in, have an operation and be back next to their friend as they wake up. So there's no sitting next to a dog in the regular practice or, you know, it's all.

And it's all geared specifically for them because birds can be a bit tricky to keep sleep because they breathe differently.

And their vet has written the book on it, literally.

This is our vet, she wrote. She literally wrote the book on looking after them. So she's, you know, he's pretty done.

All sorts of things. Yeah, I mean, there are lots of really good wildlife vets, but as just happens to be swans.

She specialises and she's not afraid to have a go either.

And recovery when it works is remarkably fast.

Swans, because of the way they breathe,.

They wake up really quickly.

So it's only about five minutes and they're a bit flippy, floppy and a bit wobbly and then they're up and having their lunch. It's really that fast.

They really, really shake it off quite quickly. Obviously they're not 100% right as rain afterwards, but you know, it can take sort of a week or so until they're ready to go outside.

But they do tend to. We try and move them through as quick as we are able just to make sure they don't get too tame.

We want to try and our goal is to keep everything as wild as possible and to get it back to the wild if we can, or get it back to a life that is as wild as we can get it.

It turns out that swan bones are hollow.

Bizarrely, swan bones are hollow. So when they break something, it's not a case of, oh, I'll pin that back together. Because nine times out of 10 it just sort of shatters like glass.

You can't fix it.

Here we have a demonstration model. So it's actually the real thing.

This is the real thing. This was. We had to get permission from the King's swan marker to get it done.

But when they break sort of these bones because they are hollow, they sort of shatter. So there's no putting it back together.

No, because it's a 10,000 piece jigsaw.

Yeah. It's not going to work. And even if you do get it back together, that particular bone isn't going to be capable of flying.

Really. It's going to be too heavy, by the way.

Too heavy and won't work. So we tend to amputate. And we amputate. Where does she take it off?

Mid top one.

Mid top. This one? Yeah, she takes it off there. That's actually part of the elbow because a you're left with not a dead swan.

We've got the lake that we can facilitate it so they live with us for the rest of their lives where they're fed twice a day and as wild as we can make it.

But when amputation isn't an option, the decision to end a life is never taken lightly.

There is an entire committee that forms before anything is put to sleep.

Yeah, it's a big decision.

All of us are involved and we go, oh, well, there has to be.

A big conversation, as there should be if you're ending something's life.

Yeah, we don't, don't take it lightly. It's not something that, you know, some.

Things are utterly obvious.

Yeah.

But usually even that still takes.

Are you sure?

I assumed the sanctuary's reach was mostly local. I was wrong.

So we've got Danny in Guildford.

Yeah, he does down as far as Portsmouth and Yep.

Leanne over at Exeter.

Yep.

We used to have a chap in Wales. He's retired now, but there are.

He does still come out.

He does still go out for rescues. He's retired in the sense that, you know, oh, you need me to do something? Okay, I'll get it. So Wales, we act as a sort of a referral centre.

So we take them from all over the place. We've had swans in from Kent. So Yeah. The lower half of the uk I think covers it pretty much.

Well, I mean, Jill went to Scotland for one, so.

Yes, she did.

She's a bit like. But she covers most of London but she can't help herself. Yeah.

I mean, if we can help, then we will. You know, if you want to transfer something down to us, go for it.

Yeah.

I mean that's how we work.

Newcastle, send. Pause for thought. Send things to us. Northampton, send things to us. We're talking about big cases or long term disabled or something like that.

And there's a sister charity they work closely with too.

There's one lifeline in Eton. We work closely with them. They're a smaller setup. They haven't got as much space as us, so they're transferring a spinal injury.

So that's going to be a long term. That could take sort of from. We don't expect to see any improvement before six weeks.

We've got a therapeutic laser we use that helps sort of bring everything back to life, as it were.

I asked what kind of person ends up volunteering here.

All of them are passionate. Yeah. Like all of them.

Not in an odd way, just passionate in that they really feel a conviction that we should be putting these things right. Somebody else has done this and we need to fix it.

Yeah. And actually the best thing about a lot of our rescuers is they are purely in it for the birds. They don't care about the politics.

And that's what makes a really, really good rescuer is they don't care about the politics that. Oh, he said, she said, going on around them. They are in it for the bird and if they can help the bird, they will.

They don't worry about the politics going on.

Like a lot of charities, they lost volunteers during the pandemic and they haven't fully recovered the numbers since.

We lost a lot of volunteers during COVID because they were all older people that, you know, were then having to.

Weren't allowed out.

Weren't allowed out. But, you know, a lot of our volunteers that were local, weren't they?

Oh, yeah, yeah. It's something we need to build up again.

Yes. But very keen for some new volunteers and that kind of stuff.

Yeah. I mean, we have to run them through Sally, because she's our supervisor and she supervises everybody.

Our vet used to give talks and she always said, if you don't take anything away from this, except one thing, it's take our phone number, because if you're in doubt, give us a ring. Because, you know, we can either reassure you. No, that's fine, madam. He's supposed to do that. Or we can find somebody that can help you.

Either us or somebody nearer or, you know, that's.

That's. And we really, most important, don't mind giving advice, even if you feel a bit silly, because we've gone. Oh, no, no. They sit like that all the time.

Like for us, we'd rather you ring and it not be a problem than you're not ring. And there is a big problem.

And if you'd like to support them directly. Money is always useful, but so are everyday items.

We use switch towels and blankets.

We do. And we've got an Amazon wish list that sort of has our most used items, things that we always.

Yeah.

Always happy to receive.

And people are incredibly generous on that, to be honest.

Yeah. We had a lady, she spent over a thousand pounds on the wish list.

Her dad had given her a thousand pounds to spend however she wished and that's what she wanted to do.

I asked what it's meant to become part of the Shepperton community.

Oh, I think it's lovely. I think the people are really. I think they're quite proud of us.

Yeah.

And it. We. We certainly feel like part of the community now.

Yeah.

We've got areas around Shepperton that are repeat offenders for swans and the people that are. That live there notoring us. Yeah. There's a particular house up the road that always gets a swan in their garden. Sorry, the.

Oh, Fordbridge Park. Fordbridge Park.

They've always got a swan.

I've got this one. Oh, yeah. I'll go with you. Give me a minute. Yeah, all right.

We're.

Which bit are you in?

And they're all really lovely and I think because they're an older community, I think they quite like the excitement having to ring us and they will come out and look and they're, oh, is he all right? What will happen?

Yeah.

So they're really good. Naturally. There's a lady up there that looks after the hedgehogs too, which comes in handy because we have the old hedgehog.

Yeah.

But I think, yeah, I think it's just nice to be part of the community.

That was Mel and Gemma Nelson of The Swan Sanctuary. Multiple generations of one family, still doing what Dot Beeson started in a back garden over 40 years ago.

Thanks as always to the partners and supporters backing the Sheppertonian through the Business Club, the Ferry Coffee Shop, Meon Media, the Sound Boutique, Island Motors and LuvBiltong. Their support keeps this podcast rooted in the community. I'm Gareth, this has been the Sheppertonian, and until next time, I'll see you around.