Whooping Crane among Sandhill Cranes, Green Island Wetlands, Iowa
A big storm went across last night, with a number of destructive tornados touching ground in several areas, including here in Iowa, making me rethinking the plans for today. I had already postponed my first real test of the new photography blind last weekend, due to winter weather conditions, but I was eager to try out the new tool and just hoped the birds would cooperate a little and show up for some pictures today. Well, it all happened and I will write about my first experience with the ”TRAGOPAN Grouse V+ photo blind” in a later post, because something very exciting came across before I was able to set up the tent.
While entering the Green Island Wetlands today, driving slowly and scanning the landscape with my eyes for any kind of wildlife, another car wanted to pass me quickly. The driver waved at me thankfully after I moved over. I just wondered about because almost everybody drives slowly on top of the dyke. The car stopped a little further down the trail behind another car and soon I discovered three other birders pointing their spotting scopes at a group of Sandhill Cranes. The driver of the ”fast” car was Tony, a knowledgeable birder that knows the area very well and had given me many tips for finding certain species before. I stopped, Tony came up to my car and just said, there is a Whooping Crane.
What a thrill to see the tallest bird in North America out in the wild! This species declined to around 20 birds in the 1940’s but due to captive breeding, wetland management, and an innovative program that teaches young cranes how to migrate, the numbers have risen to about 600+ in the wild today (source: Cornell website, allaboutbirds.org). The Whooping Crane is listed as federally endangered.
My observations and the photo above indicate that the Whooping Crane was not very welcome among the swoop of 20-30 Sandhill Cranes, who foraged in the fields that serve as an easement on the west side of the Green Island Wetlands. I have seen Whooping Cranes once before at the International Crane Foundation in Baraboo, Wisconsin, that is home to a captive population of cranes. Seeing finally one at Green Island Wildlife Management Area here in eastern Iowa was a wonderful moment that made my day! Well, I guess we can talk about the first impressions with the new photo blind later…