The beaver and the Swans

摘要

Flying at 500 feet, pilot and biologist Bruce Conant looked in the direction I called and banked the de Havilland Beaver toward the swans on the lake a mile away. We were flying as part of a month-long U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service project to study the Alaskan population of trumpeter swans before their annual migration south. Throughout last August, 14 aircraft flying up to eight hours a day would scour some 50,000 square miles of habitat, the largest attempt in the world, project managers believe, at an exact census of wildlife. Our job was to record the location of each sighting and tabulate the number of adults and young in every brood. With wildlife survey flight time in my logbook, I was on board as a volunteer observer.