Story originally printed in the Winona Daily News or online at www.winonadailynews.com
Published - Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Wis. whooping cranes arrive at final migration stop in Florida
DUNNELLON, Fla. — A group of 17 endangered whooping cranes completed a 1,262-mile migration Monday, arriving at the Chassahowitzka National Wildlife Refuge.
The “Class of 2007” crossed seven states since Oct. 13 and is the seventh group to be guided by ultralights to Florida from the Necedah National Wildlife Refuge in Wisconsin. The group flew its last 26-mile leg of the trip early Monday.
The cranes are part of a project to establish a viable eastern migratory flock to help preserve the species. They were guided south by volunteers from Operation Migration, whose pilots teach them to migrate.
They will return to Wisconsin on their own this spring.
Liz Condie, an Operation Migration spokeswoman, said on the group’s Web site that 16 of the 17 birds made Monday’s flight. One had an injury on its wing from a pen and was taken by one of the volunteers, Condie said.
Monday’s flight took about 40 minutes with an additional 20 minutes or so of circling the area to get the cranes to land, Condie said.
The birds, born last spring, had been slowed by cold weather and heavy rains near the Florida-Georgia border. Bad weather repeatedly delayed this year’s migration.
Last year’s project was struck by tragedy when 17 chicks who had successfully migrated drowned at Chassahowitzka during a February storm. Another died later. They were trapped in a pen used for protection against predators.
Volunteers modified the pen this year, installing a release gate that will automatically open in a flood, according to the Web site.
Several other cranes have died from various causes, leaving the adult flock in the wild at about 52 cranes.
The group is “very relieved and very happy” that the cranes finally made it, Condie said when reached by cell phone.
The site says the volunteers plan to with a dinner celebrate Monday night.
“It is the last time we will all be together until next fall, so along with much handshaking and backslapping there will also be some goodbye hugging going on,” Condie said on the site.
Operation Migration is a founding member of the Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership, an international coalition of public and private organizations. It has conducted the reintroduction project to try to return the species to its historic range in eastern North America.
On the Net:
www.operationmigration.org/Field—Journal.html
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