Whoopers complete migration
to Florida following ultralight ‘parents’

It was the longest trip yet. But nearly 100 days after first leaving Wisconsin and following ultralights used as surrogate parents to teach the migration route, a group of young whooping cranes finally has a place to call home. This year’s 3 1/2-month trip was marred by rain, cold, fog, winds and just about any other bad weather you could imagine. It meant Operation Migration volunteers had many down days waiting for conditions to improve. The 16 whooping cranes finally finished the 1,262-mile trip January 28, arriving at the Chassahowitzka National Wildlife Refuge in Citrus County, Florida at 8:48 a.m. But they’ll find one thing different at their new home — an automatic gate has been installed in the top-netted pen that has latches connected to floats. If rising water lifts the floats to a certain level, the latches will release and the entire gate will fall open, releasing the birds. Last year’s entire flock of young whooping cranes was killed during violent storms in February 2007 when their pens flooded. These whooping cranes are the seventh group to be guided by ultralights to Florida from Necedah National Wildlife Refuge in central Wisconsin. The Whooping Crane Eastern Partnership, an international coalition of public and private organizations, is conducting the reintroduction project in an effort to return this endangered species to its historic range in eastern North America. When the Class of 2007 birds makes their spring migration back to Wisconsin, there will be 76 migrating whooping cranes in the wild in eastern North America. Whooping cranes were on the verge of extinction in the 1940s. Today, there are about 500 birds in existence, 350 of them in the wild. Aside from the 76 Wisconsin-Florida birds, the only other migrating population of whooping cranes nests at the Wood Buffalo National Park in the Northwest Territories of Canada and winters at the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge on the Texas Gulf Coast. Did you know? Whooping cranes are a 65 million-year-old species and evolved shortly after the last dinosaur disappeared. They were on the verge of extinction in the 1940s due to hunting and habitat loss. Today, there are more than 300 birds in the wild, including 42 migratory whooping cranes in the wild in eastern North America. They get their name from the loud and penetrating unison calls. Hear a Whooping Crane. Whooping cranes live and breed in wetland areas where they feed on crabs, clams, frogs and aquatic plants. They are 5-feet tall, have white bodies, black wing tips and red crowns on their heads.

Top and middle: The whooping cranes pass over Dunnellon, following a “surrogate parent” ultralight. Ultralights are used to teach the whooping cranes the migration route from Wisconsin to Florida. Photos by Paul Simison/Operation Migration Below: A close-up of one of the young whoopers. Photo by Operation Migration .

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