While I was visiting the Riefel Bird Sanctuary in late March I asked about the sandhill crane family that I photographed last year and used as reference for my drawing “The Family Outing”. They were still there and the little baby was nearly grown up!! This little family loved the Sanctuary so much that they decided to stay for the whole year. I really enjoyed the seeing them as when I first took my pictures last June, the young crane was only 18 days old. Two babies had hatched at the end of May and the other one had died after only 5 days. I must admit when I talked with Riefel Bird Sanctuary later in the year I was afraid to ask about the family.
So here are pictures of the young crane with one of the parents, I like to think it is the mom as it is a little smaller than the other adult. They were out feeding and very oblivious to any people walking by. I guess after living in a place for over a year you do feel that you own it!! They also told me that the adults may boot the young one out of the family and lay another egg so I will definitely check on that later this spring. Here again is my picture of the family on one of their early “Family Outings”.
THE FAMILY OUTING - 11 x 15 in.
6 comments:
Wonderful portraits of the crane family!! :) Thanks for the background information. I'll be looking to see what happens this spring.
The cranes are only starting to come back to our area so a sighting is still very rare. Last winter they had 11 at the sanctuary and this winter there was only 6 there. They are such a big, beautiful bird.
It's a beautiful drawing, Wendy, and a wonderful story. Thank you for the crane update.
Love the drawing of the Cranes. Isn't is nice to go back and see the same birds and th babies grown up. Lovely update and great photos.
Beautiful birds and beautiful photos too. Of course, I love your graphite drawing of them and the touch of red is just perfect!
Thank you Katheryne, Dors and Barb. It is really so nice to see birds and animals in their own environment. It is such a treat.
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