Crane Count 2018 - Preview

Next weekend, on Saturday morning, a host of birders across the Midwest will participate in the Annual Midwest Crane Count.

It will be dark. It will be cold. It will be early in the morning.

The count will start the same way as every year. At about 5:45, I'll roll out of bed, grab a pair of flannel lined jeans, my winter coat, hat and gloves. Grab the camera and binoculars, although they will be useless until the sun comes up.

I will drive to the marsh and listen. Initially, it will be too dark to see but the cranes near the Sugar River will call to each other, so long as I listen, I will be able to spot them. By the end of the count, 8:00 AM, the sun will be up and the air will just be starting to warm, and with any luck I'll get some pics of my crane neighbors.

Sandhill crane ambling through the marsh - 2016

Next weekend will mark my third Crane Count. In 2015, I counted by myself. I spent most weekends that spring familiarizing myself with marsh. Getting to know the inhabitants and the migrants. And it's now my spot.

In 2016, I invited my father to join me. We followed my routine from 2015. Bundled up and headed out into the dark. I could hear the cranes calling the dark, and with his poor hearing, he questioned if we'd see them. As the sun started coming up, we first saw Wilson's Snipe take to the air in flight displays. By the time we reached the south end of the state natural area, we could see a pair of cranes in the reeds. As 8:00 AM approached, we headed back to the north end of the marsh, we had another pair fly just overhead and came across the one pictured above moving through the marsh alone.

Last year, we had planned to do it again, but do it bigger. We had hoped to go out to Horicon Marsh or Necedah National Wildlife Refugee to see if we couldn't come across Whooping Cranes in our count. Instead, I sat by his side in Illinois. He'd had a stroke caused by a brain tumor and wasn't doing well. I told him that I'd continue to count each year, and one day I'd still make it out to one Wisconsin's federally protected wetlands, and that I'd take my oldest with me when she got older.

This year, I will return to the local marsh to count cranes. Like my most recent birding adventures, I'll bring his binoculars with me. And later in the month on what would have been his 70th birthday, I will head to Horicon National Marsh and spread some of his ashes there. These will be our last birding trips together, and at the same time, whenever I go out carrying his binoculars, I don't feel alone.