Bird of the Week – Sandhill Cranes

The Sandhill Crane Festival was last month here in Fairbanks. WC thought he’d break out of the usual Bird of the Week format and help folks get ready for autumn with an essay he wrote for another forum a few years ago.   THE MAGIC OF SANDHILL CRANES Each fall, several thousand Lesser Sandhill Cranes stage at Creamer’s Field Migratory Wildlife Refuge as a part of their fall migration. The Refuge, a former dairy, is managed by the Alaska Department of Fish & Game as a working farm and hosts large numbers of waterfowl in both the spring and fall. But it’s in the fall…