Sandhill cranes feeling at home

Sandhill cranes fly in formation near Grand Island, Neb. A pair has made a home at Metzger Marsh. NATI HARNIK / AP Enlarge

Sandhill cranes are continuing to strengthen their toehold in northern Ohio's wetlands, with a nesting this summer right on Toledo's eastern doorstep - at Metzger Marsh State Wildlife Area in Jerusalem Township.

A pair of sandhills there is rearing one young, known as a colt, said Dave Sherman. Sherman is a biologist at the state's Crane Creek Research Station at Magee Marsh State Wildlife Area in western Ottawa County.

Recently a team from Crane Creek mist-netted one of the adult sandhills at Metzger, thought to be the female, and attached a satellite transmitter. They also took blood samples, which were sent to the International Crane Foundation in Wisconsin.

In all Sherman hopes to place 10 of the transmitters on cranes now living in eight northern Ohio counties. Keeping track is the birds will be critical, he explained, because Kentucky and Tennessee are proposing crane hunting seasons this fall and concern has arisen about birds from Ohio's nascent population succumbing during southbound migration.

Sandhill cranes are large, stilt-legged wetlands wading birds. Graceful and seemingly tireless on six to seven-foot wingspans in high flight, up close these big, ungainly looking, gray birds with red patches on their foreheads look primitive, and they are.

They are the oldest living species of bird known in the world. Fossils more than six million years old have been found in Nebraska. Their plaintive calls high overhead indeed sound ancient - it is described phonetically as "garoo-a-a-a-a!" and it can carry a mile or more.

Of 15 species of cranes in the world, sandhills are among only four species not considered vulnerable to extinction. North America is home to only two crane species, the sandhill and the whooping crane, the latter the most endangered crane in the world, the population currently listed by the ICF at around 400. In contrast, the six subspecies of sandhills number about 650,000 and are listed generally as stable to increasing.

In Ohio the last historic pair of sandhills was recorded in Huron County in 1926. But in 1985 a pair appeared in Wayne County and started nesting successfully in 1987. Since the early 1990s the number of nesting pairs has inched up in Holmes, Wayne, Trumbull, and Geauga counties in the north-central and northeast regions of the state, and in 2001 year a nest was confirmed at Lake La Su An State Wildlife Area in Williams County in northwest Ohio.

The latter was the first nest in the region since a small breeding population disappeared in the 1880s.

Sherman said that a pair of sandhills has been nesting at Magee since 2008 and a pair began at Metzger last year. In 2008 23 pairs of Ohio sandhills produced 19 young, and last year 19 pairs produced 23 young. But Sherman is quick to dismiss concern over a decline in pairs immediately. "They're so secretive, so scattered. Almost all the information comes from volunteers."

Sherman thinks that the sandhills in northwest Ohio represent an expansion of crane flocks from southern Michigan, where, he said, "they're growing by leaps and bounds." Eastern Ohio birds likely have come from Ontario flocks.

The 957-acre Phyllis Haehnle Sanctuary in Jackson County, Michigan, is the nearest site to Toledo for reliable autumn crane-watching. Peak numbers, usually between 2,700 and 3,000 cranes, occur in late October. The sanctuary can be called at 517-769-6891.

About 50 miles farther west lies another Audubon holding, Baker Sanctuary, in Calhoun County, north of the town of Marshall, Mich. A like number of cranes show up here and in a nearby property held by the local Kiwanis Club. Baker Sanctuary can be reached at 269-763-3377.

The Jasper-Pulaski State Fish and Wildlife Area outside Medaryville, Ind., is one of the Midwest's premier sandhill viewing locales. Some 10,000 or more greater sandhill cranes usually stage on the 8,062-acre area in the fall. Peak numbers come in mid-November, but optimal viewing comes in mid to late October. The area can be called at 219-843-4841.

For more information on cranes, contact the International Crane Foundation in Baraboo at 608-356-9462, or visit its Web site, savingcranes.com. For details about whooping cranes in particular, contact the Whooping Crane Conservation Association at whoopingcrane.com.

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Hornet nest collections - Hornet nests are lagging in development and are fewer in number this summer, all because of the three weeks of May "monsoons," says Russell Lamp.

He specializes in collecting stinging insects for use by the pharmaceutical industry in making vaccines and is willing to collect the nests free when they reach basketball size, or larger. Hornets feed heavily on such pests as flies, mosquitoes, and yellowjackets, and they normally are not a threat to humans unless disturbed.

Lamp plans to collect nests into September and can be reached at 419-836-3710.

Contact Steve Pollick at

spollick@theblade.com

or 419-724-6068.