I was on all fours, inching my way through the woods with 30 pounds of camera gear on my back. It was very early in the morning (the sun had yet to rise), I was trailing behind two men in cammo, and I suddenly wondered what a nice Jewish girl like me had gotten herself into.
I had come to Nebraska to witness one of the last great animal migrations on earth. What I’d gotten myself into, it turns out, was an experience nothing short of, dare I say, religious. Jane Goodall, who made a pilgrimage to this place every spring for many years, called it “food for the spirit.” I’m used to seeing the cranes on Sauvie Island, 10 miles north of Portland, and I go there often to photograph them, but I’m lucky if I see one or two hundred birds on a good evening. This was going to be much different, and I’d come a long way to experience it.
The Sandhill Cranes have long captured my attention and fascination. They are among the oldest of all the bird species, with fossils dating back over two million years. They’re huge, standing at 3 to 4 feet with a wingspan of close to six. They’re strong, often clocking up to 200 miles a day and traveling as far as 10,000 miles during each migration. They’re graceful and elegant, if a bit quirky and skittish. They’re great dancers, jumping and flapping and even tossing sticks in the air as they try to impress potential mates and strengthen bonds with others. Sandhill Cranes are very loud. They’re constantly cackling, emitting a rolling “bugling” call to defend their territory, communicate with fellow fliers and let their young ones know where they are. They can live to be 20 to 30 years old.
And they mate for life.
There are about one million Sandhill Cranes in the world. Unbelievably, 80% of them converge in the Platte River Valley in Nebraska each spring to rest and fatten up for their journey north to breeding and nesting grounds in British Columbia and Alaska. They spend their days foraging in the fields, then return at dusk to the shallow sandbars along the river to roost (sleeping while standing on one leg). The showstopping spectacles at dawn and dusk are what I’d come to the river to see.
The men in cammo (one a fellow photographer, the other our gracious, helpful and knowledgeable guide/photographer) and I had to crouch low and avoid quick movements as we approached the blind from which we’d get to watch the birds leave (in the AM) and return (in the PM) in numbers beyond belief. We were very close to them, and we did not want to spook them. Some 800,000 cranes would be coming and going here over the course of a few weeks, and I felt like I saw every single one of them in just a day. The sound was deafening. The birds were magnificent. At sunset, the sky gradually filled with them (you could hear them before you saw them), and everywhere I looked I began to see inkblots, musical notes, long black ribbons, and little prayers gliding on wings. At sunrise, the river was lined shore to shore with standing birds. As day broke and the sun began to move above the horizon, they put on quite a show dancing, splashing, jumping and playing with each other before taking a running start, fiercely beating their wings and then soaring above and away from us as they went to find food for the day.
My pictures likely don’t have much in common with those made by the photographer who was seated next to me in the blind. Yes, we both had long, heavy lenses (his was way longer than mine), and we were both limited to a tripod and one tear in the camouflage screen through which we stuck our lenses. While his pictures are likely in color and tack sharp, showing off the elaborate feathering, the bright red patch on the bird’s forehead and the deep blue sky and water, mine consider a different point of view. Ultimately, I hope the photos describe how the event made me feel, rather than simply how it looked.
Despite the massive number of birds, I became quite interested in the crane couples ('til death do us part) and managed to zero in on some of them. Being the romantic I am, and really missing my other half, I guess this makes sense.
So here are my photos... little poems or meditations, if you will. Plus a video I made at sunset (be sure to turn up the volume).
