Feathered Friday - A Ton of Sandhill Cranes

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(Edited)

Here are a few photos of sandhill cranes in Willcox Arizona for this #featherdfriday by @melinda010100
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Willcox is known for their sandhill crane birdwatching. Here they all gather during the winter months to escape the cold Northern winters.

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Thousands of them gather here every day and there are quite a few known areas to observe them.

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Up north here in Illinois they can be heard high up in the sky but they tend to disperse to raise their young. So I rarely get to see them in large numbers unless they are migrating high up in the sky.

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In Arizona you can see tons of them gathered together for their winter getaway. This allows for all sorts of photography opportunities.

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The bright sun and arid atmosphere also let you get decent flight photos compared to the darker humid atmospheres in Illinois. Plus in Illinois there are trees to obscure them.

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Here are a trio coming in for a landing. They saw and heard a large number of their feathered friends on the ground and wanted to join them for the party.

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Here is the big party on the ground. There must have been over a thousand landed here in this shallow lake.

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There are a number of these shallow lakes around the Willcox valley that are fed by sulfur springs or just flood water from the mountains. They make a perfect vacation spot to socialize in. Out here there are no predators that will bother them so they can relax.

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I took many photos of the group on the ground. I wonder if they pair up here in this big social event then fly back up north to raise a family?

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Here is a little video I took of them making quite a loud cacophony of noise. Now I wish I had brought my zooming video camera in my carry on luggage instead of just my cell phone.

That's all for now thanks for looking :-)



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17 comments
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Nice photos and story. In Washington we have the Othello Sandhill Crane festival everuy March to celebrate the passing through of the Sandhill Cranes in migration.

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I bet all the ones I saw in AZ are about to land over there right now. Down in Wilcox they have wine and wings festivals when the cranes arrive since they also grow wine down there.

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They seem very clumsy in the air!

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They are pretty large and gawky, not terribly graceful. But it allows for easy flight photos similar to geese.

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I heard my first Sandhills of the season on Thursday.

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I heard them on Tuesday flying over Illinois. I'll have to check the wetland areas in a couple months to see if there are any babies.

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There is a pair that nests each year at the mouth of my Creek. I can't see them through the thicket of brush, but I certainly can hear them! They sometimes sound like they're in my living room.

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They are super loud, I can reliably see them at the Zion beach state park and there is a marsh area around the picnic tables that always has a few squawking their heads off.

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I really like this photo amazing photo shoot

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It was quite a swarm of them. I hope to catch a few of them on camera raising their young this spring.

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