Friday Bird Blogging
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ENTER YOUR EMAIL HERE:CHRIS KROMM blogs three days a week for Facing South. He is Executive Director of the Institute for Southern Studies and publisher of the Institute’s award-winning magazine, Southern Exposure.
R. NEAL blogs two days a week for Facing South. Based in Knoxville, TN, R. Neal formerly ran the popular blog South Knox Bubba. He is now coordinator of KnoxViews.
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5 Comments:
great shots! What camera do you use?
Glad to see you've recovered from your case of Bird Flew.
I have to paddle over to the refuge soon. Several thousand Sandhills is an awesome sight.
Marvelous photo. Now will you please tell those of us who may not know much about birds, what exactly we're looking at and where the photo was taken. Based on the comments, I'm guessing they're Sandhill cranes in a wildlife refuge, perhaps in South Carolina? A picture really isn't worth a thousand words if you don't know the context.
Yes, these are Sandhill Cranes, one of the oldest known bird species. This photo was actually taken on a golf course in Sanford, FL last month.
(The groundskeeper came out to talk and said we could take the cranes with us back to Tennessee. It seems they have settled in there and they tear up the tees and greens foraging for food.)
The refuge mentioned earlier is at the Hiwassee Wildlife Refuge in Meigs County, Tennessee, which is near Cleveland in East TN between Chattanooga Knoxville.
It is managed by the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency as a refuge for migrating Sandhill Cranes, and more recently Whooping Cranes.
The cranes stop over at the refuge in the fall and late winter as they migrate between Florida and Georgia and their northern nesting grounds. There are approx. 50,000 cranes that stop over, and it is quite a sight to see (and hear). February is the best time for viewing.
Here's some more info:
http://www.meigscountytnchamber.org/hiwasseerefuge.htm
These are my favorite birds to see. They have been drivin out of their prefered habbitat by devolopers of "golf courses".
Several years ago I serviced business machines in schools. At one particular school there was a high windowed clearstory skylight that ran around the top of the media center. I saw Sand Hill Cranes walking around up there just about every visit. They were a deilght to the kids.
Sad to say but the populations are dwindling. Those that aren't hit by cars are taken by the coyote boom.
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