World’s Largest Sandhill Crane

World’s Largest Sandhill Crane – 29/52, BlackBerry 52 — Week 29 Jump-Off, Steele, North Dakota, July 17th 2011, photo © 2011 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.

On a July trip to North Dakota, we exited off I-94 to fill up with gas in Steele, North Dakota. Across the street, next to the Lone Steer Cafe (formerly a bustling Greyhound bus station), a 40-foot sandhill crane stood grazing in the grass. Sandy, the World’s Largest Sandhill Crane, was built in 1999 by Arena, North Dakota resident James Miller. The sculpture weighs 4.5 tons and is constructed of rolled sheet metal welded onto a steel inner frame. It was built in three separate sections — the body in one section, the neck and head in another, and pipes fitted to make the legs.

Residents of Steele, North Dakota erected the giant sandhill to call attention to the fact that Kidder County is one of the best birding destinations in North America. The Coteau Rangeland of North Dakota, commonly known as the Prairie Pothole Region, is an area of glacial potholes located in the direct path of the migration flyway making this area a favorite spot for migratory nesting birds, including the Sandhill Crane. To the west, Chase Lake National Wildlife Refuge, established as one of the country’s first wildlife refuges in 1908 by executive order of President Theodore Roosevelt, is the largest American White Pelican rookery in North America, where thousands of pelicans nest each spring.

North Dakota artist James Miller, creator of the World’s Largest Sandhill Crane, died October 17, 2002. According to his obituary in the Bismarck Tribune, Jim and his wife farmed north of Arena from 1955 until retiring in 1991. He created metal work sculptures in his shop and invented his own version of “Miller Bilt” hydraulic presses, along with everything from two wheeled trailers and wheelchair ramps to yard ornaments, docks, crystal radios, and even a steam engine. His art live on in 26 states throughout the country.

-posted on red Ravine, Monday, August 22nd, 2011

Lotus and I will continue to respond to each other’s BlackBerry Jump-Off photos with text, photography, poetry (however we are inspired) for the 52 weeks of 2011. You can read more at BlackBerry 52 Collaboration. If you are inspired to join us, send us a link to your images, poetry, or prose and we’ll add them to our posts.

-related to posts: WRITING TOPIC — ROADSIDE ATTRACTIONS,   dragonfly revisted — end of summer,  first dragonfly, Flying Solo — Dragonfly In Yellow Rain, Shadow Of A Dragonfly, Dragonfly Wings — It Is Written In The Wind, Dragon Fight — June Mandalas, sticks for legs and arms

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sticks for legs and arms

sticks for legs, Rocky Mountain Sandhill Cranes stop in on their way south for winter, December 14, 2008, photo © 2008 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.




The cranes are back. I don’t have my glasses on so at first I think they’re dogs. Big hump-backed dogs sitting in the middle of the field. Then I see their legs. Long spindly legs that don’t look like they could possibly support such big bodies.

This time there are six cranes. They seem to come in even numbers. Jim says they mate for life. Apparently they do, although if one of the pair dies, the survivor will find another mate. That’s only fair.

For the past 16 years, Sandhill Cranes and other migratory birds have been a part of our lives. Our town is on their migration path, next to the Rio Grande bosque just north of Albuquerque. We see cranes in fields that grew corn in the summer, and we sneak up on large groups of the birds during our fall walks along the river.

We’ve come to cherish their throaty prehistoric calls as they fly overhead on the way north or south, depending on the season. (And prehistoric they are; a ten-million-year-old crane fossil found in Nebraska had a bone structure identical to the modern Sandhill Crane.)

About two-and-a-half hours south of here is the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge, which is a fall and winter migration spot for one of the largest concentrations of Sandhill Cranes in the world. We went there when Dee was young enough to ride in a  trailer hitched to the back of Jim’s bike. We bicycled all around the refuge, but we were in the off season and didn’t spot many cranes.

It’s almost the end of crane’s migration through this particular part of the Rio Grande Valley, at least for this year. Monday we had snow, and this week rain and threats of more snow. Soon it will be too cold for these skinny-legged birds and they’ll move on to southern New Mexico and Texas and northern Mexico.

I like to think the group of cranes from today includes the same four that were here this past weekend. That not only do they mate for life, but that they come back to the same places—even our field—again and again.

I suppose they do.

autumn: sticks for legs
then the first snowfall arrives
winter: sticks for arms

Resources on Sandhill Cranes

• To hear the haunting call of the Sandhill Cranes and hear more about their magical southern New Mexico gathering and mating spot, listen to this 2005 NPR report on Bosque del Apache
• To hear the Sandhill Cranes and see a beautiful slide show, check out this report from the Denver Rocky Mountain News
• US Geological Survey on Cranes
• City of Albuquerque’s website on Sandhill Cranes (including interesting facts)
• National Geographic crane center (including cranecam and migration map)

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