A British conservationist is taking to the skies next year for a daring and uncomfortable 4,500-mile journey across the Russian Arctic to help save the UK’s smallest and shyest swan.

 

Sacha Dench plans to use a paramotor – a kind of parachute propelled by a motor – to brave temperatures of -9C (15.8F) as she mirrors the Bewick’s swan’s yearly migration route. The swans migrate as the northern Russian winter turns inhospitable and birds travel west to Britain and other milder climes.

 

There are an estimated 16,000 of the species left in the world, and their number has halved in the last two decades.

 

Wildlife experts do not know exactly why the population is falling so dramatically – other swan species have not suffered similar declines – but shooting by hunters, habitat loss and climate change are all believed to be factors.

 

In late 2016, Dench who works for the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust (WWT) at Slimbridge in Gloucestershire, will take flight to find out why, and push governments along her epic route to adopt an action plan that so far only Estonia has agreed to.

 

Her journey through some of the remotest parts of Europe, about 370 miles (600km), has no roads and will be undertaken in grueling conditions.

 

The expedition’s biggest achievement, she said, would be if countries along the way take up an action plan to stem the species’ decline. She will traverse 11 countries in 10 weeks, including Finland, Germany, Poland and the Netherlands.

 

The WWT team will train through 2016 to prepare for the expedition, before starting their journey at Nar’Yan Mar in the Arctic tundra. They plan to head west until they finish by flying over the Thames and ultimately landing at Slimbridge, approximately in November. (The Guardian)

 

 

PHOTO: Conservationist Sacha Dench plans to use a paramotor to mirror the Bewick’s swan’s migration route.

CREDIT: WWT.