Ziggy had told a friend of mine this morning that she thought all Mama Swan's eggs were gone. "Oh no!" my friend replied, "Mama covers them very well when she goes in the water, but they'd have to be there." Ziggy agreed that it might be the case, but as they spoke, they saw both swans on their little hill, just standing. My friend headed right over to the nest, and oh Lord, stood there gawking like an idiot she says, as a completely empty nest sat before her. "I can't begin to tell you how it hurts, she wrote, to see the lovely little hollow area Mama had fashioned using the feathers and fine grasses I brought her, where the eggs had been. They didnb't even leave her one egg!"

My friend's first reaction was, "Thank God the two swans are fine and not injured." Poor little Mama, upset - swimming back and forth toward the far end of the lagoon, and Dad still "standing guard" at the entrance to the nest area.

The utter FRUSTRATION of knowing they were fine last night when my friend made her last check... and only yesterday my friend was feeling especially happy that all had been pretty good for Papa and Mama this year.

The neatness of it all (no sign of open vandalism) convinces my friend that this was done for money. Whoever did it would have let Mama sit until they knew the eggs were safe to remove and place in an incubator.

It's not even the loss of the eggs, because we all agree it's an upward hill for little ones and their parents - but these poor birds have no PEACE!

We are just glad Mama and Papa are physically intact, but there's a huge ache for what they went through. If only they could tell us what really happened.