Article courtesy of Crane Trust
The Crane Trust continues to gain momentum in their efforts to contribute to conservation and the preservation of the whooping crane and other migratory birds. The Whooping Crane Conservation Association applauds their work and believes viewers of our web page will appreciate reading one of their recent reports. The following is an excerpt from Crane Trust’s July-August newsletter.
photo by B. Stone
The Crane Trust is one of five research groups involved in a remote-tracking study of whooping cranes in the world’s only self-sustaining flock—the Aransas-Wood Buffalo population, comprised of fewer than 300 cranes. Findings from the study will help the Trust and its partners better understand the ecology and threats to whooping cranes on their wintering grounds, breeding grounds, and their 2,500-mile migration route through the Central Flyway. Twice each year, the Whooping Crane Tracking Partnership publishes an update on its progress and findings. For the two latest reports on progress and findings, click downloads below. Above photo courtesy of Michael Sloat.
2011 Fall Report DOWNLOAD (2011 summer breeding/fall migration)
2012 Spring Report DOWNLOAD (2011-2012 winter season/spring migration)
You can download the two most recent reports at the end of this summary. Of note, the study’s research team has improved its methods of trapping and continues to catch and mark young and adult whooping cranes with GPS transmitters on both breeding and wintering grounds. For each bird, the solar-powered transmitters provide up to 4 signals a day for the life of the device (3-5 years). In the winter of 2011, that amounted to more than 11,000 locations for tracking and analysis. To read the entire article click on following link: http://www.cranetrust.org/newsletter/july-august-2012/tracking-whooping-cranes-in-space-and-time%E2%80%94telemetry-update/
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