Sandhill Cranes at Jasper-Pulaski

On Saturday, Sara and I stopped at the Jasper-Pulaski Fish and Wildlife Area en route to Indiana Dunes State Park. This area is popular during the fall migration because it is a stop-over site for thousands of Sandhill Cranes. The cranes begin to appear at the end of September and reach peak numbers (thousands in a single night) in mid-November. The evening we spent there, we saw a couple hundred cranes. Instead of staying and watching them fly in to their evening roosting field, we drove around and snapped some photos of the cranes flying in for the night.

Cranes are awesome birds for a number of reasons, but my favorite things about Sandhill Cranes is their call. This was my first time seeing a large gathering of these birds and hearing the strange sounds resonating throughout the area, over and over, was a wacky sensory experience. (You can listen to some recordings on the Cornell page here: http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/sandhill_crane/sounds)

Sara and I swapped the camera back and forth a couple times - here are some of my favorite photos from the evening.

When the cranes would come in for a landing, they would drop their legs straight down and spread their wings, lowering themselves kind of like a parachute. It was kind of awkward to watch, but it does the trick, so who am I to criticize?