Woolly relatives of horses: 15 facts about whales that will amaze you

The valuable properties of their fat, glands, whiskers and other organs made whales the object of human hunting around 800-1000 AD. e. The uncontrolled killing of these animals brought them to the brink of extinction, but fortunately, 35 years ago everything changed. On February 19, 1986, the International Whaling Commission officially banned the commercial harvest of large whales and the trade in their meat. An exception was made only for some indigenous peoples - for example, the Eskimos, Aleuts and Chukchi, since for them whale fishing is a direct source of livelihood. In addition, a number of countries (for example, Japan, Iceland and Norway) have reserved the right to catch whales for scientific research purposes.

And yet, the problem of extermination of these unique mammals has still not been solved, and illegal fishing continues to put the lives of whales at risk. Another factor that negatively affects their numbers and health is offshore oil and gas development and other sources of anthropogenic pollution. Therefore, every year on February 19, World Whale Day is celebrated, also known as Marine Mammal Protection Day. On this day, various environmental events are held around the world aimed at protecting the World Ocean and its inhabitants.

MIR 24 also prepared for World Whale Day and collected the most interesting facts about these amazing animals. Scroll down quickly!

Photo: Shutterstock/FOTODOM

Relatives of horses

This fact may come as a surprise to many, but whales are direct descendants of land-dwelling artiodactyl mammals. In modern biology, the order of cetaceans is distinguished, which combines artiodactyls and cetaceans. When and why did whales decide to return to the World Ocean? According to scientists, this happened about 54-60 million years ago. Most likely, the reason for this was the lack of food on land, which, in turn, could have been caused by some kind of natural disaster.

Scientists have shown what glaciers were like 20 thousand years ago

For comparison, the researchers took the Scottish city of Dundee. A long time ago, on the site of the city there was a glacier more than one kilometer high.

In comparison with such a giant, the Wall from “Game of Thrones” can easily be called a curb

20,000 years ago Dundee was buried deep under a massive ice sheet. This short film shows you what it might have looked like and what evidence the ice left behind

Woolen miracle-yudo

Although the appearance and internal organs of whales have changed greatly due to the influence of their habitat, they are not so different from their land-based relatives. At their core, these are typical warm-blooded mammals: they breathe air, feed their young with milk, and they even have small hair on their backs - another reminder of their connection with land.

Pregnancy in female whales lasts 11 months. Cubs are born about 8 meters in length and weigh 2-3 tons. But, oddly enough, the whale egg is no larger in size than the egg of an ordinary field mouse! But the males have something to brag about: the whale’s sexual organ is a record holder in the animal world. Its length reaches 12 meters, and this dignity weighs about 900-1500 kilograms.

For the first six months of life, baby whales feed on their mother's milk. Every day, a baby whale consumes about 350-390 liters of milk. Whales are an ideal example of how a good appetite contributes to the rapid growth of children. At six months old, the baby whale already reaches 15 meters in length and weighs about 20-25 tons.

Description and characteristics of whales

Whales are distinguished by their gigantic body sizes. Of course, length and weight vary from species to species. For example:

They are warm-blooded animals. Their body temperature is constant (about 35 to 40 degrees). The presence of a large layer of fat in whales saves them from hypothermia.

Whales breathe using lungs that have elastic muscles. Thanks to this, they have an air exchange of approximately 90% during inhalation and exhalation (if compared with a person, it is only 15 percent). Due to this, whales calmly dive into the water for 20-40 minutes, and a sperm whale, after taking a breath of air, can remain at a depth of about an hour and a half. Therefore, when whales rise to the water surface, the air they exhale condenses. This promotes the formation of a fountain. Large species of animals release a fountain under strong pressure, emitting a loud roar. It spreads over a distance of several kilometers.

Deep breath

As we have already noted, whales, unlike fish, breathe air. In one second, they inhale up to 2000 liters of air through special holes located in the back of the head - the blowhole. Whale blood is more oxygenated than any other mammal. Thanks to this, they can hold their breath for several hours and during this time cover enormous distances.

Whales are constantly forced to rise to the surface to breathe air. In the process of evolution, their body has adapted to this regime, so even during sleep, only one half of the whales’ brain sleeps - the other remains active so that the animal can surface and saturate its lungs with oxygen. Also, perhaps, whales are able to exhale in the most spectacular way: for example, when exhaling, a bowhead whale spews out a fountain up to 6 meters high.

What does the blue whale eat? Blue whale

The largest representative of the mammal family is the blue whale. One hundred and fifty tons of weight and a length of thirty meters give the blue whale the right to be considered the largest animal on the planet. The narrow head and slender body allow the mammal to move smoothly under water, cutting through its thickness. The skin has the appearance of marble stone thanks to the gray spots scattered throughout the blue body of the whale. The blue whale lives in every ocean and feeds mainly on plankton and small fish. Blue whales prefer to live and move alone. The size of the blue whale attracts poachers and scientists to it.

The blue whale dives into deep water in moments of fear or injury. Whalers, using harpoons, measured the maximum depth to which the animal descends - five hundred and forty meters, although during a normal dive a whale does not descend into water deeper than one hundred meters. After a deep dive, the mammal makes a series of surfacings in order to inhale air. The length of the blue whale makes it dive and emerge rather slowly. The animal spends three quarters of its life under water. The blue whale reproduces more slowly than other cetaceans: calves are born no more than once every two years. During one birth, only one baby is born, and the pregnancy period itself is very protracted.

The animals were practically exterminated in the last century, so now scientists are trying to increase their numbers. Today, the number of blue whales across the planet does not exceed ten thousand individuals. Poachers destroy blue whales because of the value of their baleen. It has a rich pitch black color and a triangular shape. The fringe located on the baleen plates allows the whale to feed on large crustaceans and small plankton.

The songs of an animal like the blue whale are considered very depressing. The blue whale lives about eighty to ninety years, the maximum recorded age of the animal is one hundred and ten years.

Sea singers

Whales have one amazing feature that fundamentally distinguishes them from all other animals and at the same time makes them similar to people - they sing. Yes, we and whales are the only mammals that can do this. Of course, unlike people, whales do not sing for entertainment - for them it is a way of communication and navigation. The choice of such a means of communication is easy to explain: at great depths, visibility can be difficult, and whales already see almost nothing. Smells are also not suitable as signals, since whales have absolutely no sense of smell (as well as a sense of taste).

The “song” of each whale is complex and unique; some “arias” can last several minutes, others – several hours. The singing of whales varies depending on the species to which they belong. Thus, toothless whales produce drawn-out sounds at low frequencies, and toothed whales produce high-frequency clicks and whistles. Whales perform the most complex compositions during the mating season. Scientists have also repeatedly recorded how mothers sing “lullabies” to their children.

Photo: Shutterstock/FOTODOM

Top 10 Incredibly Amazing Facts About Whales

Whales are one of the most mysterious animals on Earth. They have been mentioned in various stories, from the Book of Job in the Bible to the film Star Trek IV The Journey Home, so one would assume that we already have a fairly extensive knowledge of these creatures that live in the oceans. However, there are 78 species of whales on the planet and we still continue to learn strange things about them. For example... 10. Beluga whales love music On the one hand, we will never be able to say for sure whether belugas really love music. However, they react to it, express great curiosity and sometimes even join in the synchronized dance. In 2013, a pair of performers outfitted a boat with an underwater sound system and sailed out to sea to play an underwater symphony for belugas. The whales were extremely interested and even began to sing along, showing their admiration for music and art that surpassed the emotions of the most famous creatures on Earth. Any doubts that beluga whales enjoy music can probably be dispelled by watching the video above, which features a mariachi band playing for a captive beluga whale who appears to truly be enjoying the tunes. 9. Bowhead whales can live to be more than 200 years old

Photo: New Bedford Whaling Museum In 2007, scientists studying a dead bowhead whale discovered something very strange lodged deep within its body. Upon closer inspection, the object found was a fragment of a weapon that corresponded to a patent filed in 1879. This suggests that the bowhead whale survived an attack by a whaling ship more than 100 years ago. Scientists actually cannot agree on the maximum lifespan of bowhead whales. Most whales die between 60 and 90 years of age. However, amino acids in the eyes of bowhead whales reveal that the oldest whale ever discovered may have lived to be 211 years old. Some scientists believe that whales can live even longer than this age. The only thing we know for sure is that a person could not live that long, even without an ancient harpoon stuck in his back. 8. Female humpback whales have best friends.

The Mingan Island Cetacean Study has been using photographic techniques to study humpback whales for the past 16 years. At that time, they began to realize that female humpback whales were capable of not only being friends with each other, but also reuniting every year. They remember their friends and even find them among other whales after swimming across the ocean. This was a rather shocking discovery, given that until this point scientists believed that humpback whales were generally unsociable with each other. When a female humpback whale meets her mate, they simply swim together, eat and enjoy each other's company. These friendships appear to have a positive effect, based on the fact that female humpback whales who form friendships in this way are healthier and produce more offspring each year. However, no friendships have been observed between females and males (or even between males). For reasons no one can explain, only female whales like to be friends with each other. 7. The blue whale is the largest animal on Earth in its entire history

Photo: National New Zealand Museum Te Papa Tongarewa If most people had to guess which animal was the largest to ever exist, they would probably name some long-extinct creature, such as mammoth or dinosaur.
However, the largest creature did not become extinct. It is a blue whale, whose body length can reach more than 30 meters and weighs 180,000 kilograms. The blue whale's heart can be the size of a small car and beats loudly enough to be detected from 3,000 meters away. Its mouth is large enough to hold 100 people, and its arteries are large enough to float a basketball through them. And according to scientists, it is getting even bigger. Don't panic, the increased growth is not due to a toxic spill or gamma rays. It's all due to good old global warming. Thanks to warmer ocean currents, the number of krill in their habitat increases, and unlike other mammals, they grow in size instead of shrinking. 6. Some whales imitate human speech Whales can produce many sounds. One captive whale, a beluga named NOC, became so good at imitating human voices that researchers thought they were hearing two people talking in the distance. This went on for some time until the whale convinced a diver in his tank that someone was calling him to the surface. At first, the general scientific community was skeptical. However, upon closer examination, it turned out that the sounds made by the NOC were undoubtedly unusual for a beluga whale and had the same acoustic patterns as human speech. NOC produced these sounds by unnaturally changing the pressure in its nasal passages and inflating the sac in its blowhole. Eventually, the NOC stopped making these sounds completely. Nobody knows why. Perhaps hormonal changes with age made it impossible to reproduce sounds, or maybe she was simply tired of doing it. The most interesting thing is that the NOC was not the only one of its kind. For example, in the 1940s, there were reports of beluga whales that sounded like children. A whale named Lugosi, kept in captivity at the Vancouver Aquarium, was supposedly able to speak its name. 5. Sperm whales sleep standing up Until recently, it was believed that all whales sleep in the same way as dolphins do, in which one half of the brain alternates resting while the other remains active, allowing them to monitor potential dangers. However, in 2013, a team of scientists following sperm whales wearing tracking devices discovered something quite astonishing. They discovered a whole pod of whales off the coast of Chile. The whales' bodies were in a completely vertical position relative to the surface of the water and their heads simply rose and fell on the surface. Scientists were able to get right into the center of the school and even nudge one of the whales. At this moment, all the whales came to life and swam away. They were just sleeping. This means that sperm whales sleep in one of the strangest ways known in the animal kingdom. Presumably they dive down and sleep for periods of time, which can last up to 12 minutes, and then slowly drift towards the surface, head first. Additionally, for some reason that remains unknown, they only sleep between 6:00 pm and midnight. 4. Whales feed by swallowing water, the weight of which corresponds to the weight of their bodies. Scientists have discovered that whales have a mysterious organ that is not found in any other known animal on Earth. This organ, which is the size of a grapefruit, is found in the chins of baleen whales. At the moment, no one knows exactly why they need this organ. However, it is believed to allow the whales to "lunge feed". Lunge feeding occurs when whales rush forward towards their prey (plankton or fish, depending on the species) and completely engulf the schools, swallowing them along with the water. This means swallowing huge amounts of water during lunge feeding. Whales can actually absorb a volume of water equal to their body weight. The whales then filter the food from the water using "whiskers" in their throats. The newly discovered organ helps whales control vast amounts of water with precise movements that help filter the water that ends up in their stomachs as a result of this feeding method. 3. Moby Dick really existed

Photo: Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Nowadays, most people would dismiss the idea of ​​a vindictive whale seeking revenge on whalers as ridiculous science fiction. However, Herman Melville based his idea of ​​Moby Dick on real events and a real whale named Mocha Dick. The event Melville read about occurred in 1820 when Mocha Dick attacked and sank an English ship. The crew landed on a deserted island, where they had to resort to cannibalism. Mocha Dick's descriptions of that era largely coincide with Melville's descriptions. He was a white albino whose emission of stream through his blowhole sounded like a continuous roar. However, reports from the time describe him as even more terrifying than his fictional namesake. He was covered in barnacles and was usually seen still hauling harpoons and ropes from previous encounters with whalers that had failed to kill him. 2. Whale Songs Spread Like Pop Music Scientists studying humpback whale songs in 2011 discovered something very strange. The rise and fall of an individual whale's song is very similar to the rhythm in pop songs. In any area shared by whales, everyone sings the same song. Over time, the song will change, and if the new song is rhythmic enough, it will spread to other whale populations. When a new whale song appears, it is sometimes a sort of remix of the previous song. And this is not just a gross simplification. A University of Queensland researcher who analyzed this strange trend described it as "like an old Beatles song mixed with a U2 song." Other times, the new song may be completely original. The most popular songs act like music charts, gaining popularity as more whales sing them and then travel east to other whale populations. 1. Whales accept other animals and objects

Photo: Alexander DM Wilson/Aquatic Mammals Not all whales are as rugged as Piss Dick. Most of them tend to behave quite affectionately, even towards other species. For example, in 2011, a pod of sperm whales adopted a bottlenose dolphin born with a deformed, S-shaped spine. A pod of dolphins supposedly rejected him because of his deformity. Logically, it makes sense that slow-swimming whales would be very attractive to such a sociable animal as the dolphin. However, experts remain puzzled as to why the whales so readily accepted him as a member of the group. In similar but sadder cases, female beluga whales sometimes mistake objects for foster babies. Female beluga whales carry boards, other small objects, and even entire reindeer skeletons on their heads or backs, and treat them like calves. + Osedax (Zombie Worms)

Photo: Natural History Museum Whales have the largest bones on the planet. If no one got rid of them, the seabed would be forever cluttered with whale bones. Luckily, there's a creature that does the job: Osedax. Osedax's scientific name is Osedax mucofloris, which literally translates to "bone-eating snot flower." It's an apt name: Osedax burrow into whale bones and develop a root system, the few parts of the worm's body that remain on the surface covered in mucus that looks like snot. If that doesn't sound weird enough, Osedax don't have mouths, so their skin produces an acid that can break down bones. They then feed on the proteins and collagen that are released from the bones. However, the worm does not have a digestive system or anus, which makes it even stranger and deepens the mystery of exactly how it processes the food it produces. The best guess at the moment is that Osedax absorb collagen and protein through a symbiotic parasite that exists inside their bodies. So, Osedax is an acid-spitting monster that feeds on bones and has parasitic creatures living in its body. Spiders don't seem so scary anymore, do they?

The loneliest whale

The story of the so-called “Fifty-two Hertz Whale” became widely known in its time. This is how scientists named an individual of an unknown species of whale, whose signals were first recorded back in the 1980s. This whale is unique in that it sings at a frequency of 52 Hz - much higher than blue whales (15-20 Hz) or fin whales (20 Hz).

To this day, scientists cannot determine the species of the mysterious whale. Experts from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (Massachusetts, USA) believe that this may be a mutant or a hybrid of a blue whale and a whale of another species. The unknown singer is often called "the loneliest whale in the world" because in the entire history of observations his signals have never been mixed with the signals of other whales.

Healing fat

We have known about the beneficial properties of fish oil since childhood, and it was for this substance that whales were killed for many centuries. Dense fatty cover is also necessary for the whales themselves: it protects them from the cold, so whales can safely navigate even the coldest seas. In some individuals, the body fat content reaches 50% of the total mass. In addition, fat increases buoyancy and makes the animal’s body more streamlined. Fat reserves are especially important for species that migrate long distances, such as humpback whales. During their travels, they survive solely on their own subcutaneous fat. Another interesting fact: at great depths, the eyes of whales begin to secrete... fatty tears! They protect their eyes from salt and help improve visibility.

The outdated name for whale oil is blubber. This substance is obtained from the blubber of whales and other aquatic mammals; it has a yellow or brown color and an unpleasant odor. Blubber has always been one of the main products of whaling. Some peoples of the North still use whale oil as food and fuel for lamps. In addition, blubber was previously used in the production of rawhide and suede.

Perfumers' treasure

The most famous of all toothed whales is the sperm whale. At one time, it was considered the treasured trophy of every whaler, and all thanks to the magical spermaceti. Spermaceti is a fatty, waxy substance found in the sperm whale's head. People have found a lot of different uses for it. In the 18th century, candles were made from spermaceti; later they began to use it as a lubricant and a base for the preparation of creams and ointments.

But sperm whales were even more prized for their ambergris, a hard, waxy substance that is secreted in the sperm whale's intestines. Ambergris is formed when damage occurs to the whale's intestinal walls. Most often these are cracks from the horny beaks of squids and other cephalopods, which the sperm whale “dined” on at its leisure. Now that whaling is prohibited, the only way to get ambergris is to find pieces of it (it is hard) washed ashore. Currently, almost all collected natural ambergris is instantly bought up by perfume companies to make expensive perfumes.

Big and fast

Whales have fantastic speed for their size. The fin whale is considered the fastest: representatives of this species can reach speeds of over 45 kilometers per hour in times of danger. For a long time, scientists have been struggling with this mystery: according to all the laws of physics, whales simply have nowhere to get the energy to move so quickly underwater. Trying to find answers, researchers created wooden models of whales and towed them underwater, but the numbers just didn’t add up.

Everything became clear only after a frame was created with an elastic outer covering that imitated the skin and fat of a whale. It turned out that it is thanks to the elasticity of the outer tissues that whales are able to develop such a high speed for their weight. They are very sensitive to water pressure, and the movements of their fins reduce friction with the water.

Tail - here is my document

Even for an experienced observer who has been studying whales for a long time, it is not so easy to immediately distinguish one whale from another, and even more so for the average person. But the whales themselves easily distinguish each other in a school - by their tails. The fact is that each whale's tail is unique, just like a person's fingerprints. In nature, you will never meet whales with two identical tails. And all thanks to numerous “signs” - scars from killer whale bites, cuts, grooves, spots of brown algae and other marks that create a unique pattern on the surface of the tails.

Photo: Shutterstock/FOTODOM

Appearance

The average body length is from 22 to 27 meters, and females are larger than males; weight can reach 190 tons. The blue whale got its name from the bluish tint on its back, and these whales are nicknamed minke whales. He received this nickname because of the many parallel stripes and folds on his belly. Like all baleen whales (filter feeders), the blue whale has no teeth. Instead, he has hundreds of special fringed plates (whalebone) used for straining food. In addition, he has the largest tongue in the world, the size of a car. The whale's tail is horizontal and can lie on the surface of the water. While swimming, whales make vertical movements with them up and down. Whales lack external hearing organs traditional for animals - ears. They hear through the lower jaw, from which sound travels to the middle ear, and then to the inner ear.

The tail of a blue whale can be compared to a human fingerprint: grooves, cuts, scars and patches of brown algae create unique imprints. If necessary, a whale can not sleep for three months, and if the animal does fall asleep, it is only at a shallow depth, almost at the very surface. Due to the high content of the fat layer, the weight of the whale slightly exceeds the specific gravity of water, so a sleeping whale sinks down very slowly and can drown.

Long-lived giants

Whales are famous long-livers. Some species can live to be 100 years or more. And the record holder for life expectancy among vertebrates has long been considered the bowhead whale, which lived 211 years. Blue whales live on average about 80-90 years. The oldest individual of this species lived to be 110 years old.

According to some scientists, the long life of whales is facilitated by their regular diving into icy water. But there is another point of view. Geneticists who studied the DNA of whales discovered that these animals have unique mechanisms that suppress the development of cancerous tumors and can slow down aging. So, perhaps, a more detailed study of whales will soon give humanity the secret of eternal youth.

Appearances are deceptive

We are taught from childhood: a whale is not a fish! But this is far from the only popular misconception related to whales and their origin. Thus, many classify predatory killer whales as whales; these animals are even often called “killer whales.” They really resemble whales with their impressive dimensions: male killer whales reach a length of 9-10 meters and weigh up to 8 tons. But in fact, killer whales are the world's largest carnivorous dolphins. And all the confusion arose because of the British, who, back in the 18th century, incorrectly translated the Spanish name for the killer whale: asesina ballenas (“whale killer”) turned into killer whale (“killer whale”).

Meanwhile, the Arctic beluga whale is quite modest in size (6 meters in length and about 2 tons of mass) - a real toothed whale from the narwhal family. And the narwhals themselves, of course, also belong to the whales, as do the porpoises, which for a long time were previously classified as members of the dolphin family.

Where does it live?

Whales, being marine animals, are found in all oceans, but different species have their own preferences. Many species live in groups and migrate from cool to warm waters depending on the season. Whales used to be the object of fishing, but their numbers began to decline sharply. Since the introduction of a moratorium on fishing in 1982, commercial fishing of all whale species has been prohibited.

Despite this, whales are still hunted today. The moratorium did not affect indigenous fisheries for the indigenous populations of Alaska, Chukotka, Greenland and one of the Caribbean island states. They hunt whales in Norway, Iceland, Japan, but in their own territorial waters.

At the time of the existence of whaling fleets, Soviet whalers, seeing their prey, said: “There is fish!” Although they knew that a whale is not a fish, but a mammal.

Whales are unique creatures and interesting to watch, especially in their familiar environment. Whale Watching has become a popular activity for tourists and lovers of everything unusual. For this purpose, special tours are organized.

There are quite a few places in Russia to study whales:

• Shantar Islands, Wrangel Bay (beluga whales, gray and bowhead whales);
• Chukotka, Wrangel and Herald Islands (beluga whales, killer whales, gray and humpback whales);
• Kuril Islands (minke whales, Japanese right whales, humpback and gray whales);
• White Sea (beluga whales);
• Kamchatka (sperm whales and humpback whales);
• Commander Islands (rare beaked whales);
• Franz Josef Land (humpback and bowhead whales, narwhals, minke whales).

You can also choose distant shores for observation. Popular countries for a new type of ecotourism are Iceland, Norway, New Zealand (Kaikoura), South Africa, Spain (Bay of Biscay), Mexico, USA (California, Baja Peninsula).

Yandex pictures

Defenseless giants

As you already understand, whales are record holders in many areas. Unfortunately, they also have a sad record of extinction. Despite the ban on catching, over the past 30 years the global population of blue whales has decreased 100 (!) times - to 1 thousand. Some scientists believe that it is simply too late to save the largest of the cetaceans - it is doomed. The fate of bowhead whales is no better: they were discovered in Arctic waters in 1848, and by 1910 their numbers had decreased by 20 thousand. There are now only 2,200 individuals left alive in the area. Uncontrolled destruction by humans has brought the bowhead whale the sad glory of being the rarest of the largest animals. And they are really large - they reach 20 meters in length and can weigh up to 100 tons.

But it’s not just hunting that kills whales. Petroleum products and other toxins that enter the ocean every day in huge quantities have a detrimental effect on the existence of all its inhabitants. Therefore, World Whale Day, celebrated on February 19, is an excellent reason to seriously think about our impact on the ecosystem and reconsider our attitude towards both marine animals and life on Earth in general.

An ornithologist hung a GPS tracker on a bird and this is where it flew

This summer we marked the skopenka not only with a ring, as usual, but also with a GPS tracker. This is necessary in order to obtain the most detailed information about the movements of a rare predator. In addition to exact coordinates, the tracker transmits information about the bird’s speed, temperature outside, flight altitude, etc. The transmitter attaches like a backpack, weighs less than 3% of the bird's weight and sends SMS with data every hour. It is powered by a very small solar panel. Moreover, you can reprogram the beacon “on the spot” and if the bird sits at one point for a long time, reduce the sending frequency so as not to go broke on SMS messages.

Ospreys nest near bodies of water, sometimes flying 15-20 km away to fish. The pair of ospreys that raised Sanka settled a kilometer from the lake and 7 km from the Volga in the Nizhny Novgorod region, making a nest on an artificial platform at the very top of a pine tree. Ospreys breed here annually, usually raising two chicks. This year they raised only one chick, which we named Sanya (so that the Alexanders would think it was in their honor).

On August 29, having looked at the forecast and seeing that rain was predicted for September, without waiting for autumn, Sanek flew south. Having slept well, at about 10 am he set off on his first journey full of dangers.

While gaining altitude, Sanek flew at a speed of 72 km/h. Having risen 400 m, he slowed down to 25-55 km/h and so, slowly flew throughout the day. At its maximum it rose above 1000 m above sea level.

In the Nizhny Novgorod region he flew strictly in a southern direction, and leaving it he took a little to the west. It’s cool that he flew from his native Nizhny Novgorod region from the southernmost point in the Pochinkovsky district at 15:30. He flew through half the region in 5.5 hours. By car, this distance of 200 km is covered 2 times faster.

Then he went around Saransk (Mordovia) from the west, entered the Penza region and after 6 pm began to look for a place to stay for the night. As a result, he stopped in a forest belt in the middle of a field.

On August 30, at lunchtime, he was already flying past Penza, and at half past three he crossed the border of the Saratov region. Then he sharply headed towards the Caspian Sea and flew through the Astrakhan Nature Reserve, where he went fishing.

On September 9, Sanchez left Russia, spending the night in the forest on a mountain near Nalchik. He passed through Georgia in transit and flew into Turkey at 15:18. No passport checks, visas, corona tests or other pieces of paper for you. Moreover, this is not his first visit abroad; he has already been to Kazakhstan, when he flew to Astrakhan for roach.

In the night, having crossed the Red Sea, Sanya found himself in Egypt, a little south of Hurghada. From the sea, he noticed the lights of the hotel, on the roof of which, sitting on the antenna, he spent the night.

Interestingly, Sanyok usually gets up for the night around 6 pm, at which time he was flying not far from Sharm el-Sheikh and could have hung out there. But, for the first time in my life I decided to fly in the dark. Confident in his abilities, Alexander the osprey.

Right now he's holding on to the Nile. He sleeps there somewhere and sees fish in his dreams.

Read more about the project on my instagram @Aleksey_levashkin or using the hashtag #skopasanya.