Elva's Field Notes

Platt River Magic: Sandhill Cranes

... am I still blogging? When the muse calls to me .....

Watching Audubon Society's Rowe Sanctuary’s webcam of sandhill cranes has filled my heart with crane music. Much as I'd like to, I'll probably never go to Nebraska to be there in person. It requires hundreds of miles of travel; a reservation, a half mile walk in the dark in the wee hours of the morning, a fee, and sharing the experience shoulder to shoulder with other people. But on Audubon's webcam I can watch and hear one of this country's wildlife treasures: sandhill cranes coming to the shallow Platt River in central Nebraska to stay a few weeks, feed, and then continue their spring migration.

I got lucky my first morning watching. I logged at 8:45 AM (10.45 AM Nebraska CDT time) and found it had snowed in Nebraska. About a hundred cranes still lingered on the river in the greyness of a dull morning. Off in the distance crane music filled the air. The elegant creatures poked and wandered. Little did I know, all the cranes usually have left for their feeding grounds at that time of the morning.

The next two days of watching I made a point of logging in much earlier. Oh my gosh!

Day four I didn't get up early enough --7:30 AM my time-- 9:30 AM Nebraska time. Not a crane to be seen. BUT I notice a little red bar on the bottom of my screen. Audubon gives me the ability to scroll backwards and see the past 12 hours! Dusk, Birds asleep, first light, thousands and thousands of cranes, lift off at dawn ....

The peak of the gathering stretches from March 17 until April 8. I can only apologize it didn't get this blog posted sooner. Here are my sketches ... and abbreviated notes. I hope they inspire you to log on to Audubon's webcam and see for yourself.

https://explore.org/livecams/national-audubon-society/crane-camera

March 26: The cranes at Rowe Sanctuary have awakened to snow! The air is filled with crane music.

March 27: I sit mesmerized this morning -- watching thousands of cranes. Cranes are awake. Restless. Some in the air. Who could sleep with all that yammer? Occasionally a pair bounce into a brief flurry of dancing.

I'm limited by where the camera pans, but I get the deafening roar, the flowing Platt River, and the sandbars speckled with hundreds of cranes..... and then the camera shifts to the sky. Thousands and thousands of cranes are streaming by. Thousands! It looks like smoke in the sky!

According to the Iain Nicolson Audubon Center at Rowe Sanctuary between 100,000 and 200,000 cranes come here!

Mar 28: More snow last night and a little foggy this morning. At 10:30 AM CDT the sandbars are still covered with cranes. I sit down to finish yesterday's sketch. How to paint 1000s of birds?

Crane music fills my ears. It is solid background noise. Suddenly the calling takes on a new intensity. Hundreds of cranes are lifting off ... calling ... calling. A flurry of overlapping cranes, and then the sandbar is bare.

Mar 30: I thought I got up early enough for lift off. I didn't. No snow. Birds gone. Rowe Sanctuary website tells me sunrise is 7:23 AM CDT. No wonder I can't get up early enough.

BUT! I discover a new feature on the webcam. On a little red line at the bottom of the page I can scroll back as many as twelve hours. I watch past hours as if I'm watching in real time.

I can eat my breakfast and watch hundreds of light shapes hunkered in the dark. Glowing embers are the eyes of the few cranes who are awake. Even now a few birds call.

I jump ahead to the sky showing a bare suggestion of morning light.... and then scroll ahead to an hour before sunrise.

The noise level increases from occasional to a pleasant background chatter. I can see silhouettes of cottonwoods in the background and speckles of cranes massed on the sandbars and in shallow water. The sky is full of muted greys and lavenders ... gradually brightening.

7:20 AM CDT: The noise level intensifies. Thousands and thousands pick up and swirl over me. Some swing around and drop farther out on the river. Others meld into strings in the sky, flying off to their feeding grounds.