Andrew Travers:
"Thousands of sandhill cranes on an overnight stop at Fruitgrowers Reservoir this spring also served as feathered advocates for habitat conservation.
That’s the hope, anyway, of Audubon Colorado and the Sopris Foundation, the organizations that partnered to bring two bus-loads of Roaring Fork Valley residents across McClure Pass to witness the natural phenomenon.
About 25,000 of the cranes migrate through Colorado every spring, following a predictable pattern of one-night stops between their winter home in southern New Mexico and Mexico, up to their summer roost on the Yellowstone plateau in Wyoming.
Dependably, before sundown everyday for a few weeks each spring, flocks of the majestic birds — often thousands at a time — fly in over the Grand Mesa and settle in at the reservoir for the night. The wetland here, set amid the orchards and pasture of Delta County, is ideal roosting terrain for the ground-dwelling birds.
Just as predictably, the next morning they lift off and make their way north for a stop on the Yampa River.
“Seeing it for the first time is breathtaking,” Audubon Colorado director Ken Strom said on the coach bus ride down Highway 133 from Carbondale...." (Read more? Click title)
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