World's Biggest Sandhill Crane

North Dakota_38,
originally uploaded by Laurel714.

Greetings!
As part of the ProjectPlay assignment I went browsing through the pictures available on Flickr. Since one of my other passions is Sandhill cranes (it ranks right up there with the Green Bay Packers, Terry Pratchett books, Shakespeare, and dark chocolate) I thought I would explore the images available. There were over 4,300 images of sandhill cranes! What bliss to be able to look at all the pictures of cranes and to learn of other spots around the country where I can go looking for them. My goal every year is to see Sandhill cranes every month. This works out pretty well in Wisconsin from March through November. Lately with the warmer winters, I can sometimes still find cranes in Wisconsin in December and they often return in February. This leaves me to go traveling in December, January, and February, looking for them. Every February I make the pilgrimage to Kearney, Nebraska to see the annual migration of about half a million cranes that are coming up the flyway to Canada, Alaska, and beyond. In December and sometimes January I go to Jasper-Pulaski Wildlife area in Indiana (about three hours from here) where the midwest flock stages on their journey further south. You can usually see 10 to 20 thousand cranes there. I've been to Bosque del Apache in New Mexico, Georgia, Florida, and a little place in the mountains in Tennessee (by the Georgia border) to get my January cranes. It's a cool reason to travel and it gets me away from the library. Imagine my surprise when I saw this huge statue of a Sandhill Crane in Steele, North Dakota. I never would have imagined such a thing existed, and now I will have to plan a trip out to see it. That way the next time I post a picture of the giant crane, that will be the Bookrat standing in front of the legs! And now for another part of the Projectplay assignment. Let's see if I can actually post this to my blog from Flickr! Ciao!