Further to yesterday’s blog on the consequences of the Eyjafjallajökull volcanic eruption for Icelandic wildlife, including our whooper swans, we now are concerned to find that swan Y6K has chosen to migrate at just the wrong time! Having originally migrated direct from Iceland to Ireland last autumn, he moved via Kintyre to the area around the Solway in mid-winter. On 12th April he started heading north from Dumfriesshire and had reached the Outer Hebrides by the morning of 13th April. That evening he set off for Iceland and by early the following evening (on 14th April) he was more than half-way across. After spending the night on the water he made much slower headway on the morning of 15th April and seemed to be veering a little off course (northeastwards) before turning and heading northwesterly again towards Iceland yesterday afternoon. The latest data indicate that he was still about 100 miles from southeast Iceland this morning. So we wait for the next data download (scheduled for Sunday morning), to determine whether he’s merely assessing the situation before coming in to land, or whether the volcano may have caused him more serious problems during the migratory crossing.