Preparing for a Long Journey...The Sandhill Cranes of the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge

These last few days have been truly beautiful in the Great Valley of California. A couple of weak low pressure systems blew out the dust and pollution and we've had a series of gorgeous sunrises and sunsets. I had a few minutes after a lab today, and decided to see what was going on at the viewing platform at the north edge of the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge. One never really knows what to expect...last week there were around 10,000 Snow and Ross's Geese gathered in a single gigantic flock near the road. It much different tonight. The Snow Geese were off in another part of the refuge, and the fields were being patrolled by hundreds and hundreds of Sandhill Cranes (Grus canadensis).

The cranes have been here since September, wintering in the mild climate of the valley. But the season is starting to feel more and more like spring, and the birds are getting restless. Within a few short weeks they'll be gone, headed north towards the Arctic to breed and fatten up during the summer months.

Sandhill Cranes are one of the most dramatic species to grace our local environment. They are large birds, standing almost four feet tall, and they have a unique style of dancing when they are flocking together. I'm going to miss their purring call when they're gone, but it's nice to know we can look forward to their return once the weather starts to turn cold again.

Sandhill Cranes at the Merced National Wildlife Refuge (+Video)

I discovered a leucistic Black Phoebe at the Merced National Wildlife Refuge last week, and that distracted me for awhile from the actual reason we had gone down there. We were actually wanting to check in and see which winter migrants had arrived. The most dramatic of the Arctic species arriving in the last month are the Sandhill Cranes (Grus canadensis), and they were at the refuge by the thousands.

I posted a few pictures two weeks ago after our first visit, but some of the birds were closer to the road this time, so I got some nice closeups. These birds have a lot of personality at times.

I think they have a rudimentary understanding of yoga exercises if the picture below is any guide.

I mentioned in the last post how much I love the "purring" of their call. At one of our stops, a few walked nearby vocalizing, so I caught some video of the moment. Enjoy!

Welcoming the Sandhill Cranes Back to California: Merced National Wildlife Refuge

It's always bittersweet when I see the last of the tropical migrants in our region. The orioles, the grosbeaks and the warblers head south when the temperatures start to drop a little bit. Life seems a bit less colorful. But that isn't the end of the story of course. It's getting a LOT colder in the far north, and millions upon millions of birds are leaving the tundra where they breed and spend the summer. The destination for a great many of them is the Great Valley of California, where the winters are mild, and food can be found that allows survival until the spring when they can again return north.

These millions of birds include many species of ducks and geese, but one of the most dramatic arrivals is that of the Sandhill Crane (Grus candensis). In the past few weeks thousands of them have arrived. I estimated that more than 1,500 of them were flying above us last week at the Merced National Wildlife Refuge. We were back today for another look, and many hundreds were lounging about in the early afternoon.

Although somewhat similar to herons and egrets, there are only two species of crane in the United States, the Sandhill and the Whooping. The Whooping Cranes have been at the edge of extinction, with only 21 individuals in the wild in 1940. Intense conservation efforts have enabled their population to grow to about 600 individuals. The Sandhill Cranes are doing much better, with a population of around 500,000. There are subspecies that are threatened. The Florida population has been decimated by habitat loss and numbers around 5,000 individuals. The Mississippi subspecies is even more endangered, with only 129 individuals in a single refuge. The Cuba subspecies has only 300 individuals.

The Sandhill Cranes have a call that I find soothing (others may disagree). The low-pitched trilling call reminds me of cats purring. The call can be heard over great distances, and flocks overhead may be almost out of sight, and still be heard clearly.

All three of our local refuges are populated with thousands of Sandhill Cranes right now. I've seen them at the now-open Beckwith Viewing Platform at the San Joaquin NWR west of Modesto, the San Luis NWR south of Turlock, and the Merced National Wildlife Refuge where we explored today. If you've never seen these grand birds before, you should check them out!

The Most Soothing Birdcall: Sandhill Cranes at the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge

They don't call them songbirds for nothing. Many birds produce wonderful melodies that lift the heart and all that kind of thing, but for a soothing calming moment few birds can match the purring of the Sandhill Crane (Grus canadensis).

The Sandhill Cranes spend their summers far to the north in Canada or Alaska, but in winter they come to the Great Valley by the tens of thousands. For the past two weeks more than a thousand of them have been grazing and foraging in the cut cornfields visible from the viewing platform on Beckwith Road (the corn is grown specifically to feed the geese and crane who winter here). The platform is part of the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge and the birds have been quite close during my last few visits. And they are beautiful to photograph.

This afternoon some of them were hanging out in the fallow field near the viewpoint that is (already!) starting to bloom.

I've never managed to capture their soothing song before, but this week I got some pretty good video, and the birds were quite vocal.

The viewing platform is located near the west end of Beckwith Road out of Modesto, about 8 miles west of the Vintage Faire Mall. It will be open for another month or so while the geese and cranes await the thawing of the lands up north. It will be very quiet without the Sandhills!

They're Back! The Return of the Sandhill Cranes

Some very beautiful birds are back from their summer sojourn in the wilds of the far north. The Sandhill Cranes (Grus canadensis) have been sighted over our county for the last two weeks, but this weekend was our first real chance to see if they are back in large numbers at our local wildlife refuges. They are! We saw at least 260 of them at the San Luis National Wildlife Refuge and another 400 at the Merced National Wildlife. That's only a fraction of what is to come, however. In a few weeks there will be on the order of 15,000 cranes overwintering at the San Joaquin, San Luis, and Merced refuges. They'll be sharing the refuge with tens of thousands of Snow Geese, Ross's Geese, Greater White-fronted Geese and others who are still on their way, but have yet to arrive. The winter is a fascinating time in the Great Valley of California.

The birds have a unique deep-toned bugling call that can be heard over several miles. There have been times that I've heard them high overhead, but so far away that I couldn't find them in the sky. It's one of the harbingers of the fall season around here.

The Sandhill Cranes are Getting Restless

I wonder sometimes which they consider "home". Is it the Great Valley of California where they spend the winter, thriving on the grains and grasses that grow all year? Or is it their breeding grounds across the northern tier states or farther north in the Arctic (see their complicated range in the map below from Birds of North America). The answer, from their point of view, is pointless. It's just where life for them happens. One can't go to far with anthropomorphizing birds like I'm doing here.

Still, I sense a disturbance in the force as I've watched them the last few weeks. They know they are going to be leaving soon. I don't know what signals the moment to leave...the angle of the sun in the sky? The temperature? If it is temperature, they are a little bit confused right now. A week or two back it was as warm as April, but the end of February brought freezing temperatures. But in any case, they'll be heading north soon.

There are still hundreds of them in the area if you want a last look. The first picture was taken last weekend at the Merced National Wildlife Refuge. The other pictures are from a month ago at the San Joaquin National River Wildlife Refuge, but a visit last week confirmed that they are still there.

These are such grand and graceful looking birds, and though it seems strange to put it this way, their call is almost like loud cat purring. And the sound carries long distances. I've heard them flying high overhead, but couldn't locate them in the sky. If you live in a place where they visit for part of the year, they are worth an afternoon to see and observe. But if you live in the Modesto area as many of my readers do, your time is running out. They are preparing to leave soon.

Sandhill Cranes and the Great Valley That Once Was, and in Places, Still Is

These beautiful birds are among the reasons I took up bird photography a couple of years ago. I was astounded to find that Sandhill Cranes (Grus Canadensis) congregated by the tens of thousands very close to where I live, and I was not the least bit aware of it.

Living in the Central Valley of California (which I agree should always be called the Great Valley) is an exercise in frustration and futility. The natural environment, the greatest savanna environment in the United States, was almost completely co-opted by agricultural development, and then by urban development. It's not a great place for people to live...most of the jobs are poorly-paid manual labor, the soil, air and water are infused with pesticides, herbicides, and particulate air pollution, and health problems, especially asthma and related respiratory illnesses are rampant. Education is a low priority to those in power. We are consistently the first to suffer in economic downturns, and the last region to recover from them.

And yet there is still a greatness to this valley. In terms of the natural environment, dedicated people have worked tirelessly for decades to preserve the remnants of the rich ecosystem, and have worked even harder to rebuild some of the habitats as abandoned farmlands have come available. Thousands of acres of river floodplains have been replanted with native vegetation. There is now a string of wildlife refuges along the 400 mile length of the valley that provide shelter for the millions of winter migrants, the Sandhill Cranes, the Aleutian Cackling Geese, the Snow and Ross's Geese, and many others.

The Great Valley that existed hundreds and thousands of years ago is still available to observe and enjoy, and often only a few miles from the homes of everyone who lives here. In the Modesto-Turlock area, there are the San Luis and San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuges. The Beckwith Road viewing platform (part of the San Joaquin refuge) is only an eight mile excursion from Modesto's biggest shopping mall. I was there last night and had a real treat. The Sandhill Cranes are elegant large birds, beautiful to photograph, but they are a bit wary (with good reason) of human beings. They tend to stay towards the interior of the refuge, being heard more than seen off in the distance.

It's deep into winter now, and food stores are kind of low. The refuge managers grow fields of corn and other crops for the sole use of the birds, and they'll plow down the corn in sections so the birds can feed easily. Once those crops are gone, the birds make do, and last night they were roaming the plowed fields close to the road and viewing platform. I got some of my closest shots in a long time.

This is part of the valley as it once was, and still is. It belongs to all of us, and it is right in our own backyard. And to our coastal and urban center friends, don't forget that there are some incredible sights to see on the valley floor when you are on your way to Yosemite or to one of the Sierra ski resorts. For our international visitors, there are more places to see than the travel brochures hint at. If you are interested in the natural world want to see some of the real California, not just the tourist meccas, then check out these places. The refuges are worthy of a look.

Sandhill Cranes Arrive at Merced National Wildlife Refuge

Let's face it. The Sandhill Cranes (Grus canadensis) are one of our most charismatic local species, and the fact that they spend much of the year elsewhere makes their arrival a moment of celebration. I saw my first ones of the season more than a week ago, but they were hundreds of yards away, and the pictures were pretty fuzzy.

We headed out to the Merced National Wildlife Refuge this afternoon to see what was happening there, and we were pleased to see a fair number of migrants, including hundreds of Greater White-fronted Geese, a thousand or more Sandhill Cranes, and even five extra early Snow Geese

According to a gentleman at the viewing platform, there are 7,500 Sandhill Cranes at the refuge already. I had to believe him because he had an expensive spotting telescope and camera (snark), but he did have the look of a diehard birder (expensive equipment but trashy car). It was an exceedingly windy day, so the birds may have been sheltering elsewhere. Still, I was happy to get a few clearer shots than those I got last week.

The Merced National Wildlife Refuge is one of my favorite birding destinations in the Great Valley. The five-mile auto tour always provides plenty of viewing opportunities (I got pictures of at least seven species worthy of a post in just the two hours of our visit; we saw dozens of species total). It is south and west of the town of Merced on Sandy Mush Road (and I always wonder how that road got its name).

The Sandhill Cranes are Returning to the Great Valley!

We were leaving the house to run some errands this afternoon. We heard an odd sound coming from the sky. We looked far and wide and couldn't pick out the responsible party, but the call was unmistakable: it was the trilling call of the Sandhill Cranes (Grus Canadensis). Their call carries for long distances, so it wasn't too odd that we couldn't see them, but it was enough to convince us to check out the Beckwith Road portion of the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge. We grabbed some In 'n Out burgers and headed west for a quick picnic.

The viewing platform won't be open for another week or two, but the road passes through a mile or two of refuge property, so we had a chance to look for arriving migrants. We didn't see any at first, but west of the platform, we saw three individuals in a plowed field. Once we knew some of them had arrived, we looked more carefully in the distance and saw several dozen of them off to the south near the refuge ponds (Miller Lake). The pictures are fuzzy from the thermal waves emanating from the ground. As more arrive, they will spend more time near the road, and pictures will get sharper.

Ultimately, the number of Sandhill Cranes at our local refuges will number in the tens of thousands! They are coming from their breeding grounds in the far northern parts of Canada and Alaska. It is an incredible sight, so if you get the chance, check out the San Joaquin, San Luis, or Merced National Wildlife Refuges for a dramatic vision of one of the great migrations on our planet (I've included a map for the San Joaquin Refuge at the end of the post).

The was a Black Phoebe standing guard at the not-yet-open viewing platform. He struck a defiant pose, and I only got the one picture, so it's a bonus shot for this post.

Here's how to get to the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge...

Moments of Beauty: Sandhill Cranes at the Merced National Wildlife Refuge

(Yes, this is the same post as the one I just did at Geotripper. For all I know, I may different readers of my two blogs!)

It's no secret to my friends and family that I have followed the political scene closely, as bizarre as it has been. The many discussions and worries lead to all kinds of stress. In times like that, it never hurts to step back a bit and see what is happening at the nearest national wildlife refuge. With that in mind, Mrs. Geotripper and I set out to explore the Merced National Wildlife Refuge today. It's situated darn near the geographical center of the state just south of the town of Merced. 

In the winter months the refuge plays host to tens of thousands of Snow Geese, Ross's Geese, Greater White-fronted Geese, and Sandhill Cranes, all of whom spend their summers in the Arctic. The birds that arrive here have traveled thousands of miles. Not many geese were in attendance today at the refuge, but we were treated with the spectacle of thousands of Sandhill Cranes (Grus canadensis).

The birds gather thousands strong in several relatively small wildlife refuges in the Central Valley of California. 95% of our valley has been altered for agriculture and urban development, but these islands of wetlands and prairies allow the survival of several million migratory geese and cranes. It's probably a fraction of the number of birds that once filled the pre-western civilization skies, but it is a dramatic sight nonetheless. As we watched, a flock of what must have been close to a thousand birds landed in the fields before us.

The birds in general are doing okay with stable or slowly increasing populations in most areas. They mate for life, and usually raise a single chick each year. They would be vulnerable to the destruction of the wetland habitats that they prefer.

One more marvelous aspect of the Sandhill Cranes is their intriguing call. It's hard to describe, but it reminds me of the purring of a cat, amplified hundreds of times. Because of the bass tones, individual birds can be easily heard from a good half mile away. When thousands of birds are together, the sound is riotous. Check out my video from this afternoon below...

The Sandhill Cranes Are Back in California!

It's a moment I enjoy, the first journey out to our local wildlife refuge to see the returning Sandhill Cranes (Grus canadensis). The first few hundred have arrived at the Merced National Wildlife Refuge in California's Great Valley. Within weeks they will number more than 10,000. The cranes have been spending the summer in northern climes, as far away as Alaska.

They are grand birds with a huge wingspan. They graze in the grasslands looking for seeds and grains, but are not averse to the taking of an occasional amphibian or invertebrates.

The birds are famous for their complex mating dances. I got a few moments of some of them at practice this afternoon. It was pretty far away so there are heat waves and all, but it was fun to watch.


The Merced National Wildlife Refuge is a valuable part of the system of refuges that line the Central Valley. 95% of the original environment of the Great Valley has been consumed by agricultural and urban development with the attendant loss of habitat for millions upon millions of birds.

The refuges provide critical food resources and protection from predators and accidents. It's not just for the 15,000 or so cranes. Tens of thousands of Snow and Ross's Geese spend the winter in the refuges. There are hundreds of year-round resident species as well. Those are Black-necked Stilts in the foreground of the picture above.

The Sandhill Cranes mate for life, and they can live a long time. According to the ever-useful Cornell bird site, they can live in the wild for more than thirty years.

The birds are doing well overall, but some individual populations are threatened by habitat loss.

The call of the Sandhill Crane is hard to describe, sort of a low-pitched trill, but it can carry for a long distance. I've heard them clearly, and looked for them, only to find that they are thousands of feet up in the sky, or half a mile or more away across the fields.

It was wonderful to see them at home today!