WCEP NEWS RELEASE

Young Whooping Cranes Will Learn Migration Route from their Elders

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Joan Garland, 608-381-1262

July 21, 2010

Eleven whooping crane chicks arrived yesterday at Necedah National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) in central Wisconsin. The cranes are part of the Direct Autumn Release (DAR) project conducted by the Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership (WCEP), an international coalition of public and private groups that is reintroducing this highly imperiled species in eastern North America, part of its historic range. There are now 97 whooping cranes in the wild in eastern North America thanks to WCEP’s efforts.

The chicks arrived from the International Crane Foundation (ICF) in Baraboo, Wis., where the birds were hatched and raised by costumed biologists. The chicks will spend the remainder of the summer at Necedah NWR, under the watchful eye and supervision of costumed staff from ICF and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. This fall, the juvenile birds will be released in the company of older cranes after fledging, or developing their flight feathers. The young cranes learn the migration route by following these older birds. This is the sixth year WCEP has used this Direct Autumn Release method.

“We are pleased with the successful transfer of the DAR birds from the Felburn/Leidigh Chick Rearing Facility here at ICF to the Necedah National Wildlife Refuge,” said Dr. Barry Hartup, Director of Veterinary Services at ICF. “The DAR program provides WCEP with cost-effective and flexible options for supplementing the eastern migratory whooping crane population.”

In addition to the 11 DAR birds, 11 whooping crane chicks are currently being conditioned to follow ultralight aircraft by a field team from Operation Migration and the Patuxent Wildlife Research Center. This fall, Operation Migration will guide the young cranes on their first southward migration from Necedah NWR to Florida, the cranes’ winter home.

The DAR and ultralight-led chicks are this year joining two wild-hatched chicks in the 2010 cohort. WCEP has high hopes that these wild crane chicks will survive to fledge and will accompany their parents on the fall migration to the wintering grounds.

In 2001, WCEP project partner Operation Migration’s pilots led the first whooping crane chicks, conditioned to follow their ultralight aircraft surrogates, south from Necedah NWR to Chassahowitzka NWR in Florida. Each subsequent year, WCEP biologists and pilots have conditioned and guided additional groups of juvenile cranes to Florida. Having been shown the way once, the young birds initiate their return migration in the spring, and in subsequent years, continue to migrate on their own. In 2008, St. Marks NWR along Florida’s Gulf Coast was added as an additional wintering site for the juvenile cranes.

Whooping cranes that take part in the ultralight and Direct Autumn Release reintroductions are hatched at the U.S. Geological Survey’s Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Laurel, Md., and at the International Crane Foundation in Baraboo, Wis. Chicks are raised under a strict isolation protocol and to ensure the birds remain wild, handlers adhere to a no-talking rule and wear costumes designed to mask the human form.

In the spring and fall, project staff from the International Crane Foundation and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service track and monitor the released cranes in an effort to learn as much as possible about their unassisted journeys and the habitat choices they make both along the way and on their summering and wintering grounds.

Most of the whooping cranes released in previous years spend the summer in central Wisconsin, where they use areas on or near Necedah NWR, as well as other public and private lands.

Whooping cranes were on the verge of extinction in the 1940s. Today, there are only about 550 birds in existence, approximately 400 of them in the wild. Aside from the 97 WCEP birds, the only other migrating population of whooping cranes nests at Wood Buffalo National Park in northern Alberta, Canada and winters at Aransas NWR on the Texas Gulf Coast. A non-migrating flock of approximately 30 birds lives year-round in the central Florida Kissimmee region.

Whooping cranes, named for their loud and penetrating unison calls, live and breed in wetland areas, where they feed on crabs, clams, frogs and aquatic plants. They are distinctive animals, standing five feet tall, with white bodies, black wing tips and red crowns on their heads.

WCEP asks anyone who encounters a whooping crane in the wild to please give them the respect and distance they need. Do not approach birds on foot within 200 yards; remain in your vehicle; do not approach in a vehicle within 100 yards. Also, please remain concealed and do not speak loudly enough that the birds can hear you. Finally, do not trespass on private property in an attempt to view or photograph whooping cranes.

Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership founding members are the International Crane Foundation, Operation Migration, Inc., Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Geological Survey's Patuxent Wildlife Research Center and National Wildlife Health Center, the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, the Natural Resources Foundation of Wisconsin, and the International Whooping Crane Recovery Team.

Many other flyway states, provinces, private individuals and conservation groups have joined forces with and support WCEP by donating resources, funding and personnel. More than 60 percent of the project’s budget comes from private sources in the form of grants, public donations and corporate sponsors.
To report whooping crane sightings, visit the WCEP whooping crane observation webpage at: http://www.fws.gov/midwest/whoopingcrane/sightings/sightingform.cfm.

-WCEP-

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Last updated: July 23, 2010