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  • Writer's pictureLeo Wahl

Sandhill Cranes in Colorado

Updated: Jun 22, 2021


The Sandhill Crane (Antigone canadensis) is one of the largest birds in North America. It also has one of the oldest fossil records of any extant bird species, dating back millions of years. One of the most spectacular things about them, however, is seeing their massive, biannual migrations. During breeding season, they travel in pairs, but, the rest of the time, they gather into flocks that can number in the thousands. These flocks can be found at their wintering grounds, such as at Bosque Del Apache National Wildlife Refuge, or at migration stopover sites, such as in San Luis Valley, CO, or along the Platte River, Nebraska. During the summer, they will split up into their lifelong mated pairs.



This spring, we drove to San Luis Valley in Southern Colorado to see part of this migration. About 25,000 cranes migrate through the valley. At sunrise, you can see flocks of a thousand birds taking off at the same time from their roosting sites in shallow water. They will then land in open fields and feed on grains, sometimes supplementing this with tubers and small animals. Their feeding activity lasts for several hours until they “loaf” through the afternoon, eventually returning to feed and then to roost at sunset. It can be interesting to watch them perform this routine every day for the time they stay in the area.



An area where they perform this routine is typically a “key stopover site,” and is a major reason for the three National Wildlife Refuges in San Luis Valley (Monte Vista NWR, Alamosa NWR, and Baca NWR, administered under the San Luis Valley NWR Complex). The Rocky Mountain population of Sandhill Cranes typically spend more time in San Luis Valley than they do at either their wintering or the breeding grounds. Other key stopover sites are found in Utah, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas. They will stop in these places for about a month before continuing their migration north to the Rocky Mountains, Canada, and the Pacific Northwest. Other populations that winter in Florida and Cuba migrate to Canada, the upper Midwest, and the Northeast.


These key stopover sites are incredibly important for Sandhill Cranes and many other birds, migratory or not. They also are great places for birdwatchers to visit and greatly increase tourism to these small, rural areas. Sandhill Cranes have seen a major increase in their numbers and can serve as an example of the importance of protecting all areas of wildlife migration, e.g. wintering grounds, migration stopover grounds, and summer grounds. Sandhill Cranes also have some very interesting mating behavior in their summer breeding grounds which we will discuss in another post.






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