Part of the island is privately owned and it contains an automated lighthouse, several houses and an airstrip.

[1] Several shipwrecks have been recorded here of vessels passing through Banks Strait; Brenda (1832), Mystery (1850), Union (1852).

Other islands in the Waterhouse Group include[1] the Ninth, Tenth, Waterhouse, Little Waterhouse, Maclean, Baynes, Cygnet, Foster, Little Swan, Bird Rock, George Rocks, St Helens, and Paddys islands.

[2] Swan Island forms part of the Cape Portland Important Bird Area.

[3] Recorded breeding seabird and wader species are little penguin, short-tailed shearwater, Pacific gull, silver gull, sooty oystercatcher, pied oystercatcher, hooded plover, Caspian tern and crested tern.