Homing Instinct: Sandhills' Return A Marvel To Behold

At this writing in April, cranes can be expected to arrive in our area soon, in spite of this year’s stubborn persistence of dead-of-winter-like conditions. Friends tell me a vanguard has already been heard weeks ago in the skies over northern Utah.     

When we think about the Greater Yellowstone'’s wildlife, bison, wolves, and bears are likely to first come to mind, and rightly so. But on another level, the ecosystem’s pantheon of iconic species also includes others, such as the Greater Sandhill crane (Grus canadensis tabida).

Cranes are associated with myth and legend throughout the world. They are renowned for their elaborate mating dances, haunting cries, impressive size, and epic migrations. Long necked, long legged, with a large sharp beak, standing nearly five-feet tall, with a wingspan of six feet, and a life span of about 20 to 30 years; they are uniquely impressive birds by any measure. 

Cranes and their natural history are imbued with poetry. The late nature writer and naturalist, Peter Matthiessen, who loved visiting Greater Yellowstone, dubbed them, The Birds of Heaven. Widely distributed, occurring on every continent except for South America and Antarctica, the “dinosaur-like” bird’s existence goes far back in evolutionary time—the Eocene, 34 million years ago; cranes are among the world’s oldest living birds. 

Their way of being was already millions of years old when the primate homo sapiens was still developing bipedality. Renown conservationist, Aldo Leopold, in A Marshland Elegy, penned: “When we hear it call, we hear no mere bird. We hear the trumpet in the orchestra of evolution. It is a symbol of our untamable past, of that incredible sweep of millennia which underlies and conditions the daily affairs of birds and men.”

Our cranes are not limited in occurrence Greater Yellowstone, but are part of a breeding population occupying the western edge of North America’s migratory bird Central Flyway. Labeled a Rocky Mountain Population,  their spring-summer range occurs across contiguous north-south portions of Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Utah, and Wyoming, roughly encompassing Greater Yelowstone. 

The cranes occurring in our bioregion are a larger subspecies compared to the more abundant Lesser Sandhill, which migrate a half-million strong across the prairie lands to the East of us. Annual aerial counts for the Rocky Mountain Population beginning in 1984 to date have determined a relatively stable population of around 20,000 birds

There have been relatively recent advancements in telemetry research and means for inventory and tracking of cranes and others.  Those recent studies provide insights and information for the GY cranes and their important habitats and critical conservation needs.    

The natural spring-summer habitats the cranes utilize and show fidelity to in our area are, for example: large wetland complexes, smaller scattered wetlands, floodplains, moist meadows, riparian areas, willow flats, beaver ponds, and forest edges. Those habitats are associated with places within Greater Yellowstone that may also make one smile—e.g., the Bechler Meadows, Hayden Valley, Heart Lake, Fountain Flats, Teton Valley wetlands, the National Elk Refuge, Teton National Park’s Willow Flats, Grassy Lake, the Yellowstone River’s Thorofare, Gallatin Valley, Henry Lake Flats, Gardiner’s Hole, Harriman State Park, Island Park Reservoir, Red Rock Lakes, the Beaverhead and Big Hole River’s streamside’s, Reed Point Islands, and elsewhere. Those places provide nesting sites, food and forage areas, escape and concealment cover, and “roost” sites (shallow standing water).

Fall habitat in our area generally consists of networks of natural wetland features surrounded by small grain agricultural lands, such as the areas mentioned below.  While the cranes have the lowest recruitment of any avian species (about 8 percent), regulated hunting is allowed at places within the GY around agricultural areas; e.g.--portions of Teton Valley, Ashton-St Anthony, Dillion-Twin Bridges, Three Forks, Paradise Valley, Star Valley, Farson, and others. Hunting is the primary method for reducing crop damage. Generally, for example, 50 crane permits are available for Teton Valley, Idaho. 

The average hunting harvest for the entire Rocky Mountain Population is reported to be 790 birds. Crane hunting is not allowed in Yellowstone and Teton Parks, Wildlife Refuges, Teton County, Wyoming, and parts of Teton County, Idaho. 

The hunting and management of cranes is governed by the 1918 Migratory Bird Treaty Act, the oldest of all conservation laws in the United States. Administered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Act brings the management of the cranes under the purview and coordination of the Federal government.  

The Trump administration dismantled the enforcement provisions of the Act for the accidental killing of birds by individuals, businesses, or industrial sites—incidental take was deemed okay “as long as they didn’t mean to.” Biden has since restored the Act’s prohibitions for incidental take. 

Cranes are renowned for their larger-than-life migrations and large pre-migration gatherings called “staging.” Preserving flyway connectivity is a major challenge in the management of their habitat. Migrating cranes generally travel at nighttime and fly at high elevation, covering an amazing 300 to 400 miles a night. 

Telemetry and banding studies determined that the Greater Yellowstone cranes mostly winter in south-central New Mexico, in the general area of the Rio Grande Valley and Bosque del Apache Wildlife Refuge; also, possibly some from our area in the southeast Arizona playas near Wilcox.  

While cranes appear reasonably adaptable to our rapidly changing wildland-urban interface, they are known to abandon nests or territories because of human disturbance. In Greater Yellowstone, the latter might involve: the extensive exurban developments and subdivisions occurring in our eco-region’s larger valleys, which until recently, were open space or agricultural lands; draining of wetlands and irrigated areas and exporting the water; climate change as it may affect migration aridity and drying out of wetland habitats; the advent of more people, and particularly off-leash dogs, occurring across the landscape.  

For cranes to continue to flourish in Greater Yellowstone, there is a need for a “whole landscape view” that provides sustainable habitat for people, birds and other wildlife, as well as landscape function. Crane habitat conservation can translate into protection for a whole suite of other wetland-wildland dependent species.  

Across the United States, cranes are celebrated at various locations where they concentrate in large numbers along migration routes or at their wintering areas. No less than twelve crane festivals are celebrated at various locations across the U.S.  In Greater Yellowstone, an autumn pre-migration staging occurs in Teton Valley Driggs.  At any one time in early September, there can be a thousand cranes or more gathering, resting, and passing through Teton Valley, Idaho, many of which are generally easily observed and photographed. 

The Teton Regional Land Trust and Driggs Community have held a Crane Festival in September every year since 2018. This year the annual festival is scheduled for September 20 to 23.The cranes delight tourists and residents alike and support the ecosystem ecologically and economically through their presence. Protection of crane habitat features and needs can be the drivers for conservation programs and serve to assist prioritization of landscape conservation. The Greater Sandhill Crane is an “umbrella species,” meaning its habitat conservation can result in many other species ultimately being protected.