Vignette, with cranes
Wednesday, October 29th, 2008So today Emma and I got an early start for a walk on Bear’s Ditch - before noon! Yay!
It’s a beautiful autumn day. The trees have mostly turned gold. The grass in the RGNC field, which a giant noisy machine was mowing as we left, is still green. The sky was clear and painfully pure blue. It was mostly calm, except for a breeze that was all too brief. Because it was cool at my house when we left I went with trousers instead of shorts, and rather regretted it.
I heard cranes almost as soon as I got Emma out of the car. It took me a while of, well, craning around, but as we walked along the preserve’s southern fence to the ditch entrance I finally saw about a dozen, high up to the south of us, in small groups that joined and broke up again.
Trees line both sides of the ditch for maybe a quarter mile north from Candelaria. Then they give way to a clear view of the RGNC fields to the west, and on the east a field between the ditch and RGB, for one or two hundred yards. As we neared the end of that I heard a crane cry and looked up to see a solo bird flying not very high overhead. He was evidently lonely, and calling up a storm in his attempts to find his flock.
I felt seriously sorry for him, up there feeling isolated and alone. Though they’re big, formidable birds they clearly rely heavily on the flock for survival, especially on migration. Just as the redoubtable Emma depends on her pack. But I assured him (not that he, or she, could hear me) that in that place and time it was unlikely he’d be alone for long. While they’re not out in the enormous numbers we’re likely to see in just a week or two there are plenty in the area now.
Still, I continued to feel bad, until I heard other voices answering the lone flyer. I looked up to see two more winging to join him. They all seemed relieved to find each other.