Tracking Whooping Cranes: Winter 2016, Part 2

This is Part 2 of the Winter 2016 news to report about the whooping cranes of the Eastern Migratory Population.

Below, you will find reports on:

– The Last Flight of Operation Migration

– The Release of the Class of 2015

– News of the two surviving wild chicks of 2015, and their families

– An update on the 8 Direct Autumn Release chicks of 2015, and the two surviving Parent-Reared chicks.

The Last flight of Operation Migration

It was a long slow final migration for Operation Migration and its six Class of 2015 ultralight-led whooping cranes. It was made so mostly by weather conditions that kept the project grounded for long stretches waiting for the perfect conditions necessary for the cranes and ultralights to fly together.

Time finally ran out while waiting for those conditions for the final brief 23 mile flight and the cranes were crated and driven to the winter pensite at St. Mark’s National Wildlife Refuge so they could be released and eased into their real lives in the wilderness. They could be off on their first, unaided migration north to WI in as little as six weeks, and they need time in Florida to learn how to be on their own.

Operation Migration in the air for the last time with ultralight-led whooping cranes; the final flight together with the Class of 2015. This photo is by Karen Willes, who has photographed the ultralight-led cranes’ arrivals at St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge every year since 2009.  She was in Georgia, January 30th, to capture this dramatic shot of pilot Richard van Heuvelen and the six Class of 2015 cranes. Photo used with permission. (Can you see two birds, flying just off the right wingtip?)  

By some good fortune, there were veteran whooper watchers and photographers from Tallahassee, who traveled to southwestern Georgia when OM and the cranes made their second last flight. And that’s the one that, as it turns out, is the true final flight of Operation Migration and its ultralight-led whooping crane program. See the photo above, captured by Karen Willes, of this historic moment in the long campaign to reintroduce a second flock of migrating whooping cranes.

The Release of the Class of 2015

The last six ultralight-led cranes are now in the fourth and final phase of their training for real life – the “release phase.” Think of the phases this way: from hatching at Patuxent National Wildlife Research Center until their transfer to Wisconsin in early summer they were in the pre-flight training phase. In Wisconsin throughout the summer, they were in full flight training phase, and in the fall they left on migration to Florida, following the ultralights – the learning migration phase.

This fourth phase involves their release into an enclosed 4-acre marshy area of St. Mark’s NWR. They have their freedom to fly in and out of it, but their comings and goings continue to be monitored by a small staff of silent, costumed crane handlers. There are several fine posts at OM’s Field Journal right now that describe in great detail what is happening in the fourth phase.

The Stressful Process of Banding Whoopers:

The 2015 chicks were released at St. Marks Saturday, Feb. 6, and the first really important thing to happen to them after that, was the process of banding – during which identification bands and tiny tracking transmitters are attached to the legs of each bird. The cranes were kept in a small holding pen until the banding on Tuesday, Feb. 9th, and returned there for a few days following so they could acclimate, and be closely observed.

“Banding is always a stressful time for birds and crew,” OM’s Brooke Pennypacker writes. “The stress can cause injury and even death, and unfortunately, has.” But not this year! In the post, “With This Ring . . .“ Brooke describes banding step-by-step, and introduces the banding crew of nine, which included Dr. Richard Urbanek, retired USFWS biologist, and Scott Tidmus, a manager of Disney’s Animal Kingdom, and “long time friend and volunteer on the project.”

In addition to Brooke’s helpful explanations, the post (check it out) includes gorgeous portraits of the individual birds, each with their new color-coded bands and transmitters.

Take a Virtual Tour:

Other posts to see include Brooke’s “They’re Here! Whooping Crane Socialization,” in which he describes the interactions between the six chicks and four older adult birds that are happily hanging out at the pen this year. And Heather Ray’s word & picture tour of St. Mark’s NWR Release Pen. It is a virtual visit to an area the public can never see.

Where the Wild-hatched Chicks Are:  W10-15 and W18-15

Last year’s bumper crop of chicks that were hatched in the wild was unlike anything ever seen before in this reintroduction project – 24 chicks were hatched in and around Necedah National Wildlife Refuge during the spring of 2015. It was phenomenal! But the bad news that followed that best-ever nesting season is that only three of those chicks survived to fledge and one of those fledglings died on the refuge, of a respiratory infection, before migration.

So where are the two that did survive and migrate with their families?

Crane tracker Hillary Thompson recently encountered both families. In late January she blogged about finding the family group, female 9-03 and male 3-04, with their chick, w18-15, at Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge in Alabama. On February 3rd, she recorded the thrill of finding w10-15 alive and well with its family group (female 25-09 and male 2-04) in Kentucky.

Hillary was on the staff of the International Crane Foundation, from 2012 through 2014, “. . . and still haven’t quite left,” she writes on her blog’s “about” page. She is also currently working on a master’s degree from Clemson University”s Department of Forestry and Environmental Conservation.

Here is a bit more about the crane parents raising the wild chicks:

Detailed biographical records for each crane, which are kept by Journey North, make this report possible.

The female, 9-03, and her mate, 3-04, are one of the most successful parenting partnerships among the Wisconsin cranes, having now raised 3 chicks to fledge. In addition to w18-15, they were the parents of w1-10, who died in November 2013 after 3 and a half years of life, and w3-13 who died in December 2013 while on her first migration with the parents.

The pair raising w10-15 are a 2004 male (#2-04) and 2009 female (#25-09). The male of this pair has achieved his new status as whooping crane father after 3 mates and many almost-a-dad experiences. He and his first mate, 46-07 successfully hatched a chick in both 2011 and 2012, though neither survived to fledge and his mate died in August, 2012.

With a new mate, female 8-09, he successfully fostered the parent-reared 24-13, during fall 2013 and into the next spring. He and mate 8-09 had a successful nest in 2014, but their nesting ended sadly with the discovery of her death in mid-April. Male 2-04 mated again before the end of summer, and with his current partner, 25-09, successfully fostered another parent-reared chick, 27-14.

The pair and their fostered chick were back at Necedah NWR by March 31st last spring, and the successful foster parents soon had their very own newly hatched wild chick. Hopes are high for both surviving wild chicks, #10-15 and #18-15, that both will live long, and each will become a source for future Wisconsin whooping cranes.

And Here Are the Rest of the Chicks of 2015

Eight chicks that hatched in captivity in 2015, and designated for the Eastern Migratory Population of whooping cranes, were raised at the International Crane Foundation for the Direct Autumn Release program. This year they are designated #61 through #68-15. (I’ve written before about this release method; this post describes its mission and methods.)

Locating the DAR birds:

The eight have all been reported on migration and the whereabouts is known for all but one of them. That one, #64-15, was recorded having left on migration with a large group of sandhill cranes “a few days before November 24. Her signal was last heard as she traveled over Madison, WI . . .” (from the biographical notes kept by The Journey North).

A group of five of these 2015 DARs left Horicon NWR completely on their own, December 19th – not with sandhill or whooping cranes. They are #s 61, 62, 63, 65, and 67, and they were reported in an update from the Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership (WCEP) as located for a while in McHenry County, IL; #65-15 soon split from the group and followed a group of sandhills to the Goose Pond area of southern Indiana. The other four continued southwest, and are located on the border of Randolph County, IL and Sainte Genevieve County, MO.

Here is the location of the other two 2015 DAR birds: #68 went with sandhills to the Jasper-Pulaski Wildlife Area in southern Indiana, and #66 followed Sandhills there, and then on to Lake County, in Florida.

The Parent-Reared birds go it alone this year:

The two Parent-Reared birds of 2015 – neither of them in a foster family of whooping crane parents – have been tracked to Wheeler NWR in AL (#14-15) and St. Martin County, LA ( #20-15). (See Can Captive Whooping Cranes Raise a Chick for the Wild? for more information about the Parent-Reared release method.)

 

Whooping Crane Migration: Connecting the Dots for the EMP

The Eastern Migratory Population of whooping cranes – the 100 or so whoopers that call Wisconsin home – is currently spread out along the migration route from southern Indiana to northern Florida. I would guess that right now, mid-February, is when the truest picture emerges of where the Wisconsin whooping cranes reside through the winter.

Curiously enough, for most of them it’s not Florida. Even though the majority of birds in the EMP (Eastern Migratory Population ) learned the migration route from Wisconsin to Florida by following the ultralight pilots of Operation Migration, a large chunk of this whooper population – nearly 30 birds ! – has stayed in Southern Indiana. An even larger group – 34 whooping cranes – is in Alabama.

A whooping crane pair at Patoka NWR in Indiana; during fall migration in 2010. (Photo by Steve Gifford; from the Flickr photo stream of Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership; used with permission.)

All of our EMP (Eastern migratory Population) birds have been on the move since November at various locations up and down the route. For many of the birds, where they stop and spend time, their locations throughout November and December, aren’t necessarily where they’re going to stay put. And maybe in late February, certainly by the second week in March, they’ll be on the move again, coming north. Thus, February is a good month to take a look at their true winter destinations. (That’s my opinion – not a scientific observation.)

The Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership – which includes the government agencies and private groups charged with this reintroduction of the endangered whooping crane – has issued four “Project Updates” since migration began in earnest in November Each one is accompanied by a map with lots of dots signifying in a general way, the location of the entire population of our whooping cranes. You can look at the four different maps and see how their movements have changed throughout the migration, to date.

The viewing blind at St. Marks NWR, for observation and monitoring of the juvenile whooping cranes. (Photo by USFWS; from the Flickr photo stream of Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership; used with permission.)

The time period reported in the most recent Project Update covers the month of January from start to finish. In addition to the aforementioned groups in Indiana and Alabama, the distribution of whoopers includes: 7 in Kentucky, 10 in Tennessee, 3 in Georgia, and 13 in Florida. WCEP’s Project Update also includes the fact that 2-5 birds are at unknown locations, and 2 are considered “long-term missing.”

The Florida total includes the seven ultralight-led juveniles (the “Class of 2014”). Now technically free, wild birds, these juveniles will be closely monitored at St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge, until they begin their migration northward this coming spring. This will occur at a date to-be-determined – by the youngsters themselves.

Growing Up Fast: The Baby Cranes of 2014!

Yes, the baby cranes are growing fast, and the whooping crane nesting season of 2014 is fading into history – to be studied and analyzed at length for future predictions and recommendations. The tiny whooping cranes that have resulted from this year’s eggs are quickly turning into substantial cinnamon-feathered crane kids, standing tall on the longest, skinniest legs you’ve ever seen. A baby whooping, within days of hatching, looks this – on the right:

(An International Crane Foundation photo)

[ That’s a whooping crane puppet, with a days-old chick. The puppet is used to help train chicks in both the ultralight and direct autumn release programs. The chicks are costume-reared after hatching from the eggs of cranes in the captive populations.]

(A Whooping Crane Eastern Partnerhip photo)

Now, within weeks of hatching, it looks more like this (below), yet, the young crane colt in the picture is considerably more mature than the 2014 ultralight chicks at this time. To see exactly what they look like right now follow this link to the Operation Migration Field Journal, and you’ll find five photos taken by OM volunteer Doug Pellerin, of Wisconsin’s newest, youngest whooping cranes.

These chicks have been allotted to the ultralight-led migration training program. They hatched in May at Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Maryland and have been in training there – getting used to the sight and sound of the ultralight “trike” – until this past week.

On Tuesday (July 8), as happens every year to the chicks that begin life and ultralight training at Patuxent, they were placed in individual crates, and driven silently to the airport in Baltimore, Md., then flown to Wisconsin on a private jet courtesy of Windway Capital of Sheboygan.

Although this picture shows the arrival of a whooping crane chick in Louisiana for the Crane Restoration project that began there in 2011, it is a copy of the scene that unfolded seven times in Wisconsin last Tuesday afternoon. (Photo courtesy of Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries)

Their flight left Baltimore at 9:30 a.m. and by mid-afternoon, the new Wisconsin chicks were being released at the White River Marsh State Wildlife Area, where two large pens – one dry, one wet, will be their home, and a grassy runway will be their daily exercise and training site for the weeks from now until migration.

That’s the basic report on the life, to date, of the ultralight chicks of 2014. Of course it follows, with only small variations, the early days of all the whooping cranes that started life as ultralight trainees in the Eastern Migratory Population since 2001.

But that’s only part of the story of the whooping crane hatchlings of 2014. Eight more chicks are being raised, in other ways, to join the EMP whooping cranes. Here’s a brief rundown of who and where they are right now.

Four chicks are being costumed-raised at International Crane Foundation for the Direct Autumn Release program. They will eventually be taken to Horicon NWR and released near adult Sandhill cranes, in hopes that they will follow the adults on migration.

Four more chicks are to be released into the new (as of 2013) experimental “foster family” program. This program is officially known as the “parent-reared release program,” meaning that they are currently being raised at Patuxent by the captive cranes which hatched them. Later this summer they will be brought to Wisconsin and released near adult whooping crane pairs that have no chick, hopefully to be adopted by them and taught the migration route in that foster family.

Last, but really most important, are the chicks that hatched in the wild this year in Wisconsin.  While a record number of 11 chicks were hatched here, as of June 24th, only 2 are confirmed alive (although I believe there is still the possibility that a third chicks survives).  The survivors that have been confirmed are wild chick #1 of 2014, and #3-14.  On July 8th, ICF posted this beautiful photo of #3-14 with its two wild parents.  Don’t miss this one!

 

 

News briefs: All about May, and more

Look here, at the end of every week, for a collection of short news items and links to stories, events, and issues regarding Wisconsin’s whooping cranes, conservation issues, get-outdoors opportunities, and, perhaps other nature-based happenings.

Eastern Migratory Population Update

The Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership has issued the newest population update for the EMP, a period covering March 1 to April 30, 2014. It finds, “93 birds in Wisconsin, 4 not recently reported, 1 suspected mortality, and 3 long-term missing” for a possible maximum of 101 cranes.

The Badger & the Whooping Crane had focused earlier this spring on the return of the youngest cranes to Wisconsin, the ones making their first, unaided migration north, and is happy to report now that three more have been accounted for since that earlier report. The International Crane Foundation posted on its Facebook page that DAR chick, Mork, has been reported in Green Lake County, and the newest WCEP Update reports the two parent-reared chicks, # 22-13 and #24-13 back in the state.

May is American Wetlands Month

See the website of the Wisconsin Wetlands Association to learn why wetlands matter. Or visit their Facebook page to see the many reasons to explore a wetland: “Reason #1: Wetlands are watershed workhorses.” And if you happen to have any great wetland photos you’d be willing to share, email them at programs@wisconsinwetlands.org

May is “Magnificent whooping Crane Month” at the Patuxent Research Refuge

A series of free public programs at the Patuxent Research Refuge in Maryland are planned as a celebration in May of Magnificent Whooping Crane Month. Migration stories will be shared by Brooke Pennypacker one of Operation Migration’s ultralight pilots, as the headline attraction for Saturday, May 17th. All the events (check them out at the Magnificent Whooping Crane Month link!) will be held at the National Wildlife Visitor Center, part of the Patuxent Refuge complex.

The 2014 Door County Festival of Nature, May 22 – 24

The Ridges Sanctuary is hosting the 12th annual Door County Festival of Nature. The celebration for 2014 will take place May 22, 23, and 24, and includes such diverse opportunities as a full-day birding outing on Washington Island, a chance to study lake ecology aboard a Great Lakes research vessel, a tour of the uninhabited, and usually-inaccessible Plum Island, and a tour of the certified-organic Waseda Farms.

The International Crane Foundation Celebrates Three New Honors

The Jerome J. Pratt Whooping Crane award has been presented to ICF Founder George Archibald by the Whooping Crane Conservation Association. ICF’s Dr.K.S. Gopi Sunder was one of five conservation biologists in India to receive the Carl Zeiss Conservation Award, and the International Institute of Wisconsin is presenting its Corporate Citizen Award to ICF on Saturday, May 3rd.

Home Again! The Rookie Whooping Cranes That Came Back to Wisconsin

Six special whooping cranes were observed last Saturday, back home in Wisconsin. They are part of the “Class of 2013” – the 8 juvenile cranes  taught the migration route last fall by Operation Migration’s ultralight pilots. This is a victory, and  a sweet one. But it comes with a side of bittersweet, too.

Every whooping crane that returns here in the spring migration is a cause for celebration, but none more so than the youngest, still-juvenile, cranes; the ones that migrated south for the first time in the fall; the ones that had to learn the migration route from a surrogate parent of one kind or another. For eight of them that surrogate was the pilots and ultralight aircraft of Operation Migration. These eight, flew north as a group, leaving their wintering site in Florida Monday morning, March 31st.

A 2009 photo of cranes following an ultralight; by Tim Ross; at Wikimedia Commons.

Operation Migration, with the help of signals from radio transmitters banded to the cranes, reported on their whereabouts several times along the way; always with the speculation, but never with certainty that the group of eight was traveling together. This group of young whooping cranes, unlike some, “seemed to be a rather tight knit group, ” wrote OM’s Heather Ray at the group’s Field Journal. So when six of the eight arrived back in Wisconsin, where were the other two?

Efforts to train whooping cranes to migrate with ultralights begins when the colts are very young. (USFWS photo)

The answer of course, is the bitterwsweet part of this story. Before the six returnees were confirmed in print, OM had to break the sad news earlier this week that once they (OM) continued to receive radio signals for crane #1-13, still coming from Kentucky, they feared something bad had happened to her.

The “something bad” was most likely a collision with power lines, a theory that developed from checking Google Earth at the co-ordinates for the signal; clearly visible was “a transmission tower supporting several power lines.” The crane’s body was retrieved by volunteers for OM on Sunday. One more Class of 2013 ultralight crane–a male, #3-13–remains unaccounted for, but the OM crew is confident, for now, that he will be located alive and healthy somewhere soon.

In addition to the eight young ultralight-trained cranes in the Class of 2013, there are 4 other juveniles to watch for. These complete the 2013 cohort, and include two that were among the “costumed-reared” chicks, hatched and raised at the International Crane Foundation for Direct Autumn Release.

These cranes were released into the wild at Horicon National Wildlife Refuge to learn the migration route from experienced cranes. There were 9 of them released in October , but only 2 have survived into 2014. The smallest crane of this group, a female called Latka, has been positively identified in Wisconsin, in a photo posted to ICF’s Facebook page on March 19th. The most recent information I could find for Mork, the second surving DAR crane, is from the Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership’s February 28th Update.  Mork wintered in Tennessee, began migration in mid-February, and was reported in Jackson County, Indiana on February 19th.

This photo from the Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership clearly shows the difference between a juvenile and adult whooping crane. By the time they complete their first migration back to Wisconsin most young cranes have very few cinnamon-colored feathers remaining.

The final two juvenile cranes in the 2013 cohort were hatched and reared by their captive whooping crane parents at the U.S. Geological Survey’s Patuxent Research Center in Maryland. In late September they were brought to Wisconsin, and released at Necedah National Wildlife Refuge in the vicinity of adult whooping cranes, in hopes they would bond and travel south with established whoooping crane pairs.

Indeed, they did so. Here’s where they were most recently observed:  crane #22-13 was last reported, in WCEP’s update, in Washington County, Indiana, in late February. And a March 4th photo on ICF’s Facebook page shows the other parent-reared juvenile (#24-13) with its foster crane parents in Hopkins County, Kentucky where the threesome spent the winter.

In all there were 21 whooping crane chicks hatched in 2013 and reared in one of the surrogate parent programs described here. The goal, of course, is that they all become adult whooping cranes in the wild, as part of the Eastern Migratory Population. But only 11 remain.

It goes without saying that the wilderness life these creatures are intended for is hard and fraught with  uncertainty. Death from predators, disease, and accidents is a constant companion of this program that seeks to restore a wild population of whooping cranes that nests in Wisconsin and migrates to the southern U.S. It makes those that do survive all the more treasured, and explains why each scrap of good news about this endangered species is joyously celebrated.

 

 

Where the Birds Are: Various Whooping Crane Populations Explained

When we speak or write about whooping cranes it’s always good to know which population of the  whoopers we’re referring to. Although there are only a small number of these big, wonderful North American birds alive today (approximately 400 in the wild, and near 200 in captivity), they are spread across a variety of habitats and locations.

Some are divided among 3 captive populations, and others are in groups designated by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service as “non-essential experimental populations.” And 250, or more, are in the one and only self-sustaining wild flock.

So you can see, when discussing whooping crane news, it’s helpful to know which of these groups of cranes is the one from whence the news is coming. Here at The Badger and the Whooping Crane, we’re most interested, naturally, in what’s happening with the whooping cranes that migrate from Wisconsin to Florida. Known affectionately at this blog as “our cranes”, or the “Wisconsin cranes,” their official designation is the tongue twister “non-essential, experimental Eastern Migratory Population (or, to simplify,  the EMP). Responsibility for the EMP cranes falls to the Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership, written about here earlier.

An adult whooping crane pair that live within the captive population at the International Crane Foundation in Baraboo, WI. (Photo by Joel Trick, used courtesy of WCEP

But the EMP cranes – “our cranes” – are just one part of the bigger picture for the whooping crane story, and a post clarifying the various populations seems overdue. So what follows is a description of each one – population by population.

The Wild Ones

Each whooping crane in existence today is derived from the one self-sustaining wild flock – which has been brought back, literally, from the brink. The birds in this population migrate between Canada’s Wood-Buffalo National Park in northern Alberta, and the Texas Gulf Coast, crossing the international border twice each year.

Aransas National Wildlife Refuge was established in 1937 to protect critical habitat for the endangered whooping crane. (Photo courtesy USFWS: Aransas NWR page: multimedia galleries)

This flock reached its historic low point during the winter of 1940-41 when only 15 birds were counted. Public education campaigns and conservation efforts intensified after that, and the numbers have crept back up – at a snail’s pace, but consistently upwards.

A long history of close cooperation between the wildlife agencies in both countries gets a lot of the credit for keeping the species alive.

A photo of Wood Buffalo National Park in northern Canada wheret he only self-sustaining natural flock of whooping cranes nests each summer. (Photo courtesy citizenshift.org)

My source for the historical data on this Aransas-Wood Buffalo flock, and for the next section on Captive Breeding is a “Status Survey and Conservation Action Plan” (Curt Meine and George Archibald, 1996).  It’s online at the Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center; you can also access it through a link on the International Crane Foundation’s whooping crane page.

Captive Whooping Crane Populations

A new tool was added to the efforts to help the whooping crane species survive in 1967 when a captive breeding program was put in place at the USFWS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Maryland.  The Canadian Wildlife Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service cooperated to remove single eggs from the nests of wild cranes (nests usually contain two eggs) on their Wood Buffalo NP breeding grounds and transfer them to Patuxent for hatching and raising.

This tray of whooper eggs has just come out of the incubator. The eggs will be examined, candled, and weighed to see how their development is progressing. Eggs lose weight during incubation as the chicks grow and use up yolk and fluid. But if an egg loses too much weight too quickly, it can be helped by special treatments or placed in a separate incubator that has a higher humidity level. (Photo by Nelson Beyer, USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center)

By 1975 the cranes that had hatched from the collected eggs, had begun to produce their own first eggs. In 1989 the captive breeding program was expanded to include the International Crane Foundation and in 1992 it expanded to the Calgary Zoo.

Today Patuxent and ICF remain the primary centers of captive breeding. The most recent numbers I could find, are from The Journey North website, dated August 30, 2011, which lists 75 whooping cranes in the captive population at Patuxent, including 15 breeding pair, and 37 cranes at ICF with 11 breeding pair.  Six breeding pair are listed at the Devonian  Wildlife conservation Center in Calgary, and there were also 1 breeding pair at the San Antonio Zoo, and 2 at the Audubon Species Survival Center in New Orleans.

USGS employee training baby whooping cranes to follow ultralight aircraft.
(Paul K. Cascio photographer USGS Multimedia Gallery)

The Experimental Populations

Once the captive breeding programs were well-established, the efforts for preservation of the whooping crane species shifted into a new gear.  The focus became all about restoring some of the captive-raised chicks into the wild.  But how?

Much thinking and experimentation has gone into these efforts. In their 1996 report (linked to above) Archibald and Meine wrote, “Teaching migration to young whooping cranes continues to be the most significant barrier . . .” to reestablishing whooping cranes in the wild.

Since then the method of leading an annual class of crane chicks from Wisconsin to Florida via ultralight aircraft has been perfected, and has become a major factor in building an Eastern Migratory Population of 100 birds. Although the EMP flock has – as yet – had little breeding success, it continues to grow through ultralight-led chicks. That method is now being supplemented with releasing captive-raised chicks with older cranes, too.

Ultralight training of juvenile whooping cranes in Wisconsin. (Photo courtesy, WCEP)

In addition to this one quite successful – if incomplete – re-introduction of whooping cranes in Eastern North America, the partners of WCEP continue with efforts to establish a non-migrating flock in the wild. From 1993 – 2004, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Committee worked with WCEP to introduce a non-migrating flock in central Florida, but problems with drought, predators, and reproduction have brought an end to the release of new cranes into this project. Since 2011 the focus for developing a non-migrating flock of whooping cranes has shifted to the wetlands of Louisiana. In partnership with the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, the fourth cohort of juvenile whooping cranes from Patuxent was released at the White Lakes Wetlands Conservation Area early this year.

A class photo! The entire gang of adolescent whooping crane chicks together at the USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Laurel, Md. The chicks, hatched and raised by USGS caretakers, are being released into the wild in Louisiana in February 2011. It is a milestone for the state and for the birds, which have not lived in the state since the 1950s. (Photo courtesy USGS)

Whooping Crane Encounters

Have you ever seen a whooping crane? Many of the people I know would be the first to admit they know little about whooping cranes, and almost nothing about the fact that there are whooping cranes right here in Wisconsin. But as our re-introduced flock grows (the current count of our Eastern Migratory Population of whooping cranes has just been established at 108 birds) the very slim chance that you would see one increases a a little.

So, would you know what to do? There are two very important things you should know, according to the Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership.

First, keep your distance – whooping cranes are wild creatures, and big; but the real concern about human and whooping crane interactions is that the crane’s natural fear of humans will diminish with each exposure. Their fear is an important survival mechanism and must be preserved.

The second thing to do, if you are ever lucky enough to sight a whooping crane is to report it. Here is a link to an online reporting form at the US Fish & Wildlife Servicer. It’s a page long, but filling it out looks like a fairly short and sweet process. Basically USFWS wants as much information as you can supply, but if all you have is the date, and the county where you sighted the crane, that will do.

Some interesting November whooping crane encounters here in Wisconsin have been reported in blogs and facebook groups. See the re-blog post that follows. It is from Dancing Bird Studio, where blog author, Darcy, writes about a new family – 2 adults and a juvenile – of whoopers, and how it came to be; with dramatic photos, too.