Sandhill Calling

(Sandhill Cranes)

Seeing Sandhill Cranes for the first time may leave you breathless. It did me. Huge and graceful, they stalk fields and shallow marshes for most anything that moves and is the right size to eat. They belong to one of the most ancient groups of birds, perfecting their form for millions of years.

They are incredibly social and along with their “colts” often gather in groups. Seeing a dozen at a time is not unusual. But in the fall and spring as they ready for migration, you may drive over a hill and see hundreds at a time. I’m back to needing to breathe.

An August morning fly-fishing adventure in Idaho was memorable in so many ways. I caught my first trout on a dry fly and learned to actually stalk them. As my guide maneuvered our drift boat through a long, fast shoot, we passed a Great-horned Owl sitting among the branches of an old, bleached tree stump just above the water line and only feet away from me. He looked at me. I looked at him. Only the water moved.

It was another long drift under drizzling skies that set the most remarkable scene for the day—a dozen or more Sandhills on both my left and right. We were so close that I could see scales on their long legs with no need for optics. Unconcerned, they walked and pecked their furrowed fields, and chattered to each other. At one point, though, one member of the gang spotted our boat. He let out a call like a big barn door swinging on an old rusty hinge. You wouldn’t want to hear that in the night. Others took up the alarm and they called back and forth to one another across the river until we reached the next bend and they disappeared from us and us from them.