This time of year we get sandhill cranes migrating overhead and heading for their winter home at Bosque del Apache (50-60 miles south of Albuquerque). Today was one of those days. I could only catch brief glimpses because they have to get right angle of sunlight to be seen, but they were making a racket as they were changing position in the formation. This is a photo I took a few years ago.
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There’s a marsh not too far from our house that sandhill cranes come to every year, we saw a couple a few weeks ago. I’ve never seen a flock of them, usually just one or two.
What are they trying to spell?
If you turned your screen a quarter turned to the right it looks like an evil face.
The ribeye of the sky.
I hunt these myself each December in the southwest. Actually one week away from leaving.
If anyone is into hunting waterfowl, I would highly recommend going on a guided sandhill hunt. The breast meat is dark and delicious.
More tender than geese, and the hearts are bigger too if you’re into that.
Vote for me and I’ll set you free. Apparently, they are fans of the Temptations.
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I’ve lived in S. Texas near where a lot of Sandhill cranes wintered over, their mating rituals are entertaining to watch. Some Sandhills make it all he way up to Alaska in the summer.
There’s another long-distance traveler called the Bristle-Thighed Curlew that spends summers nesting is the flat tundra of Western Alaska and spends winters on tropical Pacific Islands.
I’ve seen them on the Island of Atiu in the Cook Islands, 5,500 miles south of Western Alaska, where the local Islanders know them by the name Too-ohee because their call sounds like “two-way.” The Too-ohee in the Cook Islands is considered by the locals to be good luck and they have songs about them hundreds of years old.
We have quite a few sandhill cranes, usually stomping around here in Florida. New bride has seen them in Alaska. That would be Kenai peninsula, likely Homer.
What part of Florida?
Central Fla. Orlando area.
I’ve lived in St Joe and Ft Lauderdale
Saw lots of herons and egrets, no sandhill cranes