Albino Sandhill, young Whooper create buzz in Neb.
From the Omaha World-Herald:
The curious case of two rare cranes in central Nebraska is electrifying birders as the spring migration season looms.
Spotted Sunday: A tall crane with pure white plumage mixing with grayish sandhill cranes.
Spotted Friday and Saturday: A tall crane with brown feathering among a flock of sandhill cranes.
One is an albino sandhill crane, one of four known albinos in a population of 600,000. The other is a juvenile whooping crane, an endangered species numbering about 258.
Both are rare and both happen to be in Nebraska, to the delight of Karine Gil, a researcher at the Platte River Whooping Crane Trust near Wood River.
"This is extremely rare," Gil said Monday. "There are two white birds around."
Labels: endangered species
posted by Amy at 5:18 PM
1 Comments:
My wife, daughter and her fiancé saw one or the other of these this morning along the interstate 80 at the Minden exit.
I have a hard time believing it would be a whooper, as they are normally way behind the Sandhill migration and I would wager that they are still in Texas. However, if it was an albino it appears that they saw something even more rare than a whooper (something I have wanted to see in the wild here my whole LIFE). COOL!
My advise would be to keep your eyes peeled anywhere between Lexington and Aurora on I80!
Post a Comment
<< Home