Frenchman’s Bar, Vancouver Lake Lowlands

With only a light drizzle and temperatures in the low 50s, the morning after Thanksgiving provided a good opportunity to venture out for my annual visit with the Sandhill Cranes as they pass through our neighborhood on their migration along the Pacific Flyway.

The cranes spend their nights in the marshes and shallow waters of Sauvie Island on the Oregon side of the Columbia River, and in the morning they fly across the river to the grazing habitats created by the Columbia Land Trust near Vancouver Lake in Washington. Groups of birds flew overhead regularly for most of the two hours I was there; I saw many hundreds of birds, and I’m sure many more were up earlier than I was. I watched where one group descended nearby, and hiked and listened until I found a field filled with grazing birds that was reasonably accessible (I had to go off trail but didn’t cross into any protected areas). This first field was filled with Sandhill Cranes and Cackling Geese. I then headed in the other direction, and walked the fence line until I came to a second field with cranes and hundreds of Snow Geese.

With habitat restoration efforts, every year more Sandhill Cranes stay for the winter and nest, heading north in the spring with their colts. Every so often we see or hear cranes at Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge. But seeing this many of these amazing creatures at once is a profound experience, worth repeating whenever I can.