American White Pelicans

I've seen American White Pelicans in several locations in the past few years: Yellowstone National Park, WY, Rowe Wildlife Sanctuary along the Platte River in Nebraska, Horicon Marsh Wildlife Refuge, WI, and here in Northern IL, I've spotted them on the Rock River and just a couple days ago hundreds of them in several flocks on the Mighty Mississippi River (Below, 8-7-10) near Mississippi Palisades State Park and Savanna, IL.  My "The Sibley Field Guide to Birds of Eastern North America" doesn't say they spend the summer on these rivers, but just use them as migratory lanes to their Eastern winter grounds would be located in Southern Florida, and along the Gulf Coast. In the West, they winter along Southern California's Pacific coast all the way down into Mexico's Baja Peninsula. It's hard to believe that they are already migrating in early August. Researching this I've read that they migrate South in early September through November.

A large flock of American White Pelicans on the Mississippi River with a tiny Ring-billed Gull hanging around hoping for a free meal the Pelicans may have left behind.

In the past I've seen White Pelicans in small flocks of perhaps a dozen or so. So when we were motoring down the Mississippi a couple days ago in a friend's boat, I was stunned to see them in flocks of hundreds. It was a cool sight. I thank my friend who in his effort to get me closer to the flock (Below, 8-7-10), his boat got stuck in the weeds, so he and his son had to hop out and wade through the river weeds to push the boat into safer waters - all the while I was taking pictures. Thanks, Lon and Zach - you guys are great. Some of the Pelicans have a grayish or black feathers on the back of their heads - from what I read this could be one of two reasons: 1.) After White Pelicans are finished with mating, some of their white breeding feathers turn black, or 2.) Juvenile Pelicans have not mature into their complete white feathers yet.

(Above) A nice view of the White Pelican's expandable pouch under its lower beak. The pouch is used to scoop up its meals of small fish, amphibians and crustacians, unlike their cousins (The Brown Pelican) which dive for their prey.

Take the Pelican challenge in the photo below...

Which one is not like the others?

(hint - at least three acceptable correct answers). I'll give you my answers tomorrow. Perhaps you'll find answers other than what I am thinking.

Mississippi River Birds

This past weekend Val and I joined up with friends and camped along the Mississippi River. They had a house boat and docked on a sandy beach on one of the many islands dotting the mighty Mississippi's thoroughfare, while we pitched a tent on the beach. We took a speed boat and explored along the Iowa and Illinois shores and came upon what they called "bird island" (Below, 8-7-10).

Two-thirds of "Bird Island"

 "Bird Island" is a long strip of land (maybe a 1/2  mile long) on the Iowa side of the river which comprised of two areas of land with trees, connected in between by a sandbar.  The photo above shows the sandbar on the left and the land mass to the north (right) of the sandbar. What was astounding is the number of birds inhabiting this place.  Nesting in the taller trees with bare branches to the north of the sandbar were hundreds of Double-crested Comorants (Below top, 8-7-10) and in the shorter leafier  trees a few dozen of Great Egrets (Below bottom, 8-7-10). Nesting in the trees (not shown in the photos) to the south of the sandbar were Commorants and at least one Bald Eagle. On the sandbar were a good number of American White Pelicans (the tiny white spots on the left in the photo above) and Canadian Geese. Throughout the entire stretch of the island were Ring-billed Gulls and a smattering of ducks, which I believe were our standard Mallards.

Double-crested Comorants nesting in some of the many trees of "Bird Island."

The tiny white spots are Great Egrets on "Bird Island."

"Bird Island" was quite a find housing all of these different species of water birds. I'll write more about these birds (with pics of course) in the next few days of this blog.

If you would like to see "Bird Island" for yourself, drive to the Savanna Marina, Illinois, just south of the Mississippi Palisades Illinois State Park. Take a boat south about nine miles and bird island will be on the Iowa side of the river. Even before you get to "Bird Island," you may spot several other large flocks of American White Pelicans. I'll showcase them in tomorrow's blog and throughout the week I'll showcase pics of Great Egrets, Double-crested Comorants, and Ring-billed Gulls.

Sunset from the beach of the Mississippi River Island (8-7-10)

Wattled Crane

The last of the Cranes we saw at the International Crane Foundation (ICF) in Baraboo, Wisconsin, was the Wattled Crane (Above and Below, 7-31-10) - obviously named for its white and red wattle hanging below its beak.  This was one of the easier Cranes to photo because of its extensive outdoor habitat that included lots of prairie grass and a large marsh that was very open and visible to the observer and made for a great background environment.

Standing up to 6' tall, the Wattled Crane occurs in eleven sub-Saharan countries in Africa, including an isolated population in the highlands of Ethiopia. More than half of the world's Wattled Cranes occur in Zambia. The single largest concentration occurs in the Okavango Delta of Botswana. Wattled Cranes are thought to have historically ranged over a much larger area including coastal West Africa.

Grey-crowned Crane

A very beautiful Crane (that we also saw at the Atlanta Zoo earlier this summer) is the Grey Crowned Crane (Above, 7-31-10, International Crane Foundation, Baraboo, WI), which is the National Bird of Uganda. It was fun to watch and photo this species because of its golden crown (I would have named it the 'Golden-crowned Grey Crane, if you ask me) and especially how it glowed in the late afternoon sunlight. This bird was in a large enclosure, but it was very sociable, as it wanted to come up to the cyclone fence enclosure to meet us. I wanted it to stay back in its grassy habitat for a better picture. It was a challenge to get good photos without a fence obstructing it. In the closeup photo (Below, 7-31-10) you can see the red gular sack on its throat, which they inflate then push the air out to create a booming call.

The range of the Grey Crowned Crane in eastern and southern Africa stretches from eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda, and Kenya to southeastern South Africa. They are non-migratory, but undertake variable local and seasonal movements, and are most abundant in Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania. Another subspecies occurs in Angola, Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, and South Africa. The East African subspecies occurs in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda, Democratic Republic of Congo, northern Zimbabwe, and northern Mozambique, and comprises the majority of the total population.

White-naped Crane

White-naped Cranes (Below, 7-31-10) are another interesting Crane species we saw at the International Crane Foundation in Baraboo, WI. They have a very striking appearance with a dark gray body and dark gray stripe up the side of a white neck and nape. A reddish face with a gray patch on the ear also serve to identify this species. Males and females are virtually indistinguishable, although in breeding pairs males tend to be slightly larger in size than females, which grow to about 4' tall.
White-naped Cranes in the wild breed in northeastern Mongolia, northeastern China, and adjacent areas of southeastern Russia, and migrate south through China to wintering at wetlands in the middle Yangtze River valley. An interesting tidbit is approximately 2,000 birds in the eastern portion of the breeding range migrate through the Korean peninsula and several hundred remain on wintering grounds in the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea. The remainder continues on to the Japanese island of Kyushu where they rely heavily upon an artificial feeding station.

Siberian Crane

The photo of the Siberian Crane (Below, 7-31-10), I took at International Crane Foundation (ICF) in Baraboo, WI,  is of an endangered species. The Siberain Crane can now only be found in two wild populations, in eastern and western Siberia . A central population of Siberian Cranes once nested in western Siberia and migrated to India for their winter grounds. The last documented sighting of Siberian Cranes in India was in 2002, and reports say there is a high probability this population has been recently exterminated. All but a few existing birds in the wild belong to the eastern population, which breed in northeastern Siberia and winter in China. The western population winters at a single site along the south coast of the Caspian Sea in Iran and breeds in the Ural Mountains in Russia.
The traditional migratory and wintering habitats of Siberian Cranes are under constant pressure from the demands of the growing human population. The eastern population are at risk from a loss of wetland habitat: agricultural development, wetland drainage, oil exploration, and water development projects. whereas, the western population is primarily threatened by hunting
Realizing the threats to Siberian Cranes in the wild, a top priority for ICF was to establish the species in captivity. In 1977 and 1978, under the US-USSR Environment Agreement, ICF, the US Fish and Wildlife Service and Russian counterparts orchestrated the export of hatching eggs from Russia. Seven eggs were transported 10,000 miles from the nests of wild cranes to incubators in Wisconsin. All hatched and three pairs were reared. Concurrently, ICF helped Russian colleagues establish a captive breeding center for Siberian Cranes at the Oka Nature Reserve near Moscow. Today there are several hundred Siberian Cranes in captivity at special facilities in Belgium, China, Russia and the USA.

Greater Sandhill Crane

Of the 15 species of Cranes in the world, one that is the most common in the Midwest, including migration routes through Northern Illinois and Wisconsin is the Sandhill Crane. On our visit to the International Crane Foundation (ICF) in Baraboo, Wisconsin, we saw a few Sandhills. The ones we saw were 4' tall  Greater Sandhills (Below, 7-31-10) in captivity, but the ICF boasts that they have had several wild Sandhills nesting on their grounds this spring.  There are also Lesser Sandhills that are smaller in stature at 3'-6" and also are more brown in their overall color.