we join the Cranes for dinner

I'm not an avid birder, I don't keep lists and notebooks of my avian encounters like a serious bird enthusiast, but Mrs Coot and I do enjoy viewing wildlife of all kinds, and one inhabitant of the northwoods we encountered on our recent vacation to Michigan's Upper Peninsula was Grus canadensis - the Sandhill crane.

Beautiful and regal looking Sandhill Cranes 

Michigan's DNR says the following about our Crane friends:

Sandhills are a tall, long legged, long necked gray bird with red featherless foreheads. They feed on frogs, fish, and insects, but also take much plant food such as seeds, fruits, and aquatic vegetation. They are often seen feeding in corn and upland grain fields. In Michigan, sandhills nest in solitary nests on the ground near or over shallow water in marshes and bogs. They nest by heaping plant debris into a low mound. Two eggs are laid; the young follow the parents soon after hatching, fly in about 70 days, and stay with the parents for nearly a year. Sandhill cranes are intolerant of human disturbance. Their numbers were much reduced by habitat loss and shooting in the early part of this century but have grown in recent decades. A two year survey funded by the Nongame Wildlife Fund confirmed 805 breeding pair statewide. Most breeding pairs in the Lower Peninsula were found in a six county area near Jackson and Ann Arbor. Highest concentrations in the Upper Peninsula occurred in the eastern counties.

Even from within our "truck blind" we found that the Cranes eyed us warily as they foraged.

Mrs Coot and I found this group of Cranes during one of their regular feeding forays on a overcast morning just off of Alger County Road H-58 near Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore.  It's my understanding that Cranes in the area we visited usually nest in sedge marsh habitat but often feed in mornings (and again in afternoons) in the clearings of upland fields.

The group of Sandhill Cranes we encountered added up to six total, a nice little flock of birds for us to observe. 

It's said that Cranes are an ancient bird species, one of the oldest still alive today.  According to Wikipedia:

The Sandhill Crane has one of the longest fossil histories of any bird still found today. A 10-million-year-old crane fossil from Nebraska is often cited as being of this species, but this is more likely from a prehistoric relative or the direct ancestor of the Sandhill Crane and may not belong in the genus Grus

It was difficult though to keep more than four Cranes in the camera's frame

This was the only time on our vacation that we regretted not bringing along our 300mm lens, as we might have been able to shoot better close-ups of the Sandhill Cranes with that lens.  Ultimately, we choose to take only a single lens for our Nikon camera, an 18-200mm VR II.  Although it's not a perfect choice for all situations, it prevents us from haviign to try and carry multiple lenses on hikes, which itself is priceless.

We observed the Cranes for a good 15 minutes before they wandered out of sight.

 It's our understanding that these Cranes do not well tolerate a lot of disturbance by man, so we observed at a respectful distance from the roadside, never leaving our trusty Toyota Tacoma pickup truck.  It was a wonderful encounter!