STAFF from the WWT headquarters in Slimbridge have issued simple guides to help distinguish Bewick’s swans from similar species ahead of their migration across Northern Europe over the next month.
Bewick’s swans look similar to other swan species, especially whooper swans, but unlike these species, Bewick’s are in trouble.
They are more compact than the whooper swan with a shorter neck, their bill is slightly less yellow than black and the yellow is generally a rounded patch.
The number of Bewick’s swans in Europe and western Russia has declined by 40 per cent in the last 20 years, there are now fewer than 18,000 left.
Bewick’s swans complete an extraordinary migration, travelling 8,000km from the Russian arctic to the Netherlands and the UK and back again each year.
It is illegal to kill or injure Bewick’s swans anywhere in Europe or western Russia, however, the swans face many threats such as loss of wetlands, illegal shooting, lead poisoning and collisions with powerlines.
The Bewick’s swans depart from their roosts at WWT’s headquarters at Slimbridge in Gloucestershire, UK and at WWT Welney on the Ouse Washes in Norfolk, UK on clear nights towards the end of February.
They then make their way eastwards in steps over the following eleven weeks, crossing Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Finland and Russia before reaching their breeding grounds near the mouth of the Pechora Delta in the Russian arctic in early May.
To download the ID guide visit bit.ly/2mIdWP6
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