Whopping Crane Die-off Possible For Second Year In A Row

The world’s last remaining natural flock of endangered whooping cranes, which suffered a record number of deaths last year, will probably see another die-off because of scarce food supplies at its Texas nesting grounds this winter, wildlife managers said.

The flock lost 23 birds in the 2008-2009 winter season, in part because its main source of sustenance, the blue crab, all but vanished from drought-parched southern Texas. The rains eventually came, but they were too late to produce healthy amounts of blue crabs for this winter.[1]

After working for decades and setting aside thousands of acres of tidal marshes, could it be such a little blue thing like a crab that finishes off these grand birds?

Sad to say I have never managed to make a trip down the coast to visit the Aransas Refuge during the winter nesting season, so I have yet to spot any whopping cranes in the wild…Maybe someday.

My visits to our own local National Wildlife Refuge for the past few years has brought the calamity even closer to home. Dried out ponds nonexistent flocks have made the trips a frustration. This years visits have left me wondering where the sandhill cranes are. Usually, even in the bad years there a huge flocks of sandhills eating in fields around the refuge…On a couple of trips this winter, while water levels were back, the cranes were not to be found.

There is talk of trying to provide supplemental feed to the whooping cranes…The only problem…No one knows if the birds will even accept the food.

I remember growing up along the Texas coast and listening to the annual whooper census. In the early 1960’s the total number of birds was barely 50. It would go up a few one year and down a few the next year, but for the longest time it hung around the 50 – 60 range.

[1] Officials fear another whooping crane die-off | Houston & Texas News | Chron.com – Houston Chronicle.