Walking Wild: Youth Ambassadors undertake 154km wildlife survey in the Highlands
Photo: Liane and Felix
Two of the Mammal Society’s Youth Ambassadors (Felix and Liane ) will be undertaking a 154km wildlife survey in the Highlands from 23rd to 30th June 2025, as they trek the iconic route of the West Highland Way.
Along the route these intrepid young wildlife enthusiasts will be looking out for wild mammals and the signs of their presence, including tracks, scat, burrows and feeding signs, and recording them on the Mammal Mapper citizen science app. Liane and Felix will be walking the entire route, camping each night, and will generate a line of biodiversity records from Milngavie to Fort William, a route that includes lowland moors, forests, woodlands, lochs, rivers, waterfalls, and hillsides.
The pair are two of the founding members of the Mammal Society’s Youth Ambassador programme, started in 2024. They have already taken part in marine mammal surveys from the Ullapool-Stornoway ferries in 2024, and helped define a new ‘Junior Membership’ for the Mammal Society.
One in four native mammals in the British Isles are threatened with extinction, and yet they are among the most under-recorded wildlife due to the challenges of monitoring diverse, elusive, mainly nocturnal and often subterranean animals. This hampers conservation efforts, since the precise population and range of threatened mammals is not always clear, and the impact of threats they face (such as habitat loss, roads, disease, climate change etc) are not always tracked, meaning that it can require a lot of work by mammalogists to obtain an up-to-date picture. Citizen science monitoring of mammals by volunteers can make a huge difference to the data available to inform conservation practice and policy. The Mammal Society has created a free app (Mammal Mapper, available on Android and Apple) to allow anyone to record the animals they see or the signs of their presence. Records – ideally accompanied by a photo to allow expert verification – are used by the society to inform research and reference, and passed onto local record centres and to the National Biodiversity Network (NBN) to improve national open-source biodiversity data. To encourage people to record mammals in their local landscape or when out walking, the Mammal Society provides information and training via its resources, website and training programme, and supports a network of local volunteer-led ‘Mammal Groups’ around the country to survey and raise awareness of mammals.
The Highlands of Scotland are particularly under-surveyed due to the low population and rugged terrain. By undertaking this incredible feat, Liane and Felix hope to encourage others to download the Mammal Mapper app and do their bit to improve understanding of mammal populations, wherever they are in the British Isles. They also hope to raise £5133 to help the Mammal Society’s vital conservation work. This precise figure is chosen because Liane calculated that 5133 blue whales (based on the largest individual measured – 30 metres long) swimming in a line would be the same length as the route of the West Highland Way! That number of whales would represent between half and a fifth of the population of blue whales now left on Earth, as their numbers are estimated between 10,000 and 25,000 individuals (down from over 100,000 a century ago). Liane and Felix hope to raise £1 for every ‘blue whale walked’!
For more information and to support the young conservation heroes reach this target, visit Liane’s Just Giving page: West Highland Way for Mammal Society
Notes for Editors
Images
Images taken by the Youth Ambassadors during their walk will be available from the afternoon of Monday 23rd June, with a full selection available at the end of the week. Images of mammals and their signs to represent the wildlife they will be looking out for along the route can be provided by the Mammal Society on request – including mountain hare, red deer, pine martens and more.
To request images please email Alana Scott on media@themammalsociety.org
Interviews and quotes
Felix, Liane and Mammal Society CEO Matt Larsen-Daw are all available for live or recorded interviews throughout the week (including evenings) and after the event and can provide answers to questions over email for printed articles.
About the Mammal Society
Established in 1954, the Mammal Society is Britain’s leading charity devoted to the science-led conservation of mammals. They work to raise awareness of the issues mammals face, sharing scientific research so that populations can be protected and restored across the British Isles and Ireland. Ensuring a bright future for British mammals, the Mammal Society inspire conservation projects, empower stakeholders through training and resources, and raise public awareness through education and campaigns.
Contact
Alana Scott
Communications and Campaigns Lead
