Spring just sprung, and with it came hundreds of thousands of Sandhill Cranes.
The cranes are on the return leg of their winter migration, coming from South America and the Southern U.S. back to their nesting and mating grounds in Canada, Alaska and far East Siberia.
Bill Taddicken, director of the Rowe Sanctuary in Kearney, Nebraska, said the cranes number in the thousands to hundreds of thousands, given the right conditions. While their numbers can vary, their schedule is pretty consistent, he said.
“Generally, we say they arrive by Valentine’s Day, the peak is around St. Patrick’s Day, and they’re gone by Tax Day,” Taddicken said.
Josh Wiese, habitat ecologist at the Crane Trust in Wood River, Nebraska, said their migration pattern forms almost an hourglass shape that channels them through Nebraska, specifically the Platte and Big Bend Rivers.
“At the Crane Trust on the Eastern half of their migration, they are showing up early and they are leaving early, right? Cranes stay an average of 2-3 weeks to get the energy reserves they need. By the time the Western portion starts to peak, we’re already generally starting to lose birds here,” Wiese said.
Wiese added that the third week of March is probably the peak population of the cranes in Nebraska. The best place to see them during the day is in bare fields. Here, they feed on leftover crops and the bugs that eat them. At night, they roost along the river or on sand bars, where they have a wide field of view and greater distance between them and potential predators. These factors largely contribute to their stopping here, Wiese said.
As farming gets more efficient, Wiese said, there will be less stray crops for them to feed on, which may lead to slight decreases in migratory populations, but this is far in the future.
Local law enforcement reminds drivers not to pull over on paved highways or asphalt county roads when watching the cranes, as this presents a road hazard.
