Crane Ranch 5-28-23 - 6-3-23

After a few days in Crossroads, we got back to Camp Crane Sunday afternoon.  We checked the DGF tanks and only got 1 frog.  

We took a walk along the Dees Trail and found a Narrowleaf Whitetop Aster blooming in the recently burned savanna.

Sunday Pics:

We spent Monday morning doing what we love, riding around in the refuge.  We checked the Firetower nests.  Mean Momma's nest was still active, the unbanded pair is not.  Hopefully, they have hatched.

We saw over 25 Cranes while we were out and about.  Most of them were not staying around for a photo.  

We thoroughly enjoyed the bursting colors of the savanna, along with a few critters.

We found the Rock Hill family doing well.  The chicks are growing like a weed.

Super Dad and his Colt are doing well too.  Grow babies Grow!!

We checked the DGF tanks captured 4 frogs then relaxed at Camp Crane.

Monday Pics:

After a couple of trips and a lot of time and muscle, we got the Fontainebleau Trail parking lot signage updated.  While we were there, we did some lopping to clear out trees that were encroaching on the parking area.

During our 2nd trip to Fontainebleau, we checked on Dougie and found his mate alone foraging in Bright's Pasture.  It looks like they have renested!

While looking for Super Dad and his colt, we found a Yellow-crowned Night Heron along the ditch at C Bird Road.  

We took the Browns Trail short cut back and placed a couple of boundary signs on the entrance at Allen Road.  We just happened to see a few critters and a few pretty savannas on our way back to Gautier Vancleave Road.

Tuesday Pics:

Wednesday, we spent most of the day cutting grass and weed eating.  After we got finished mowing, we took a ride to the boat shop to get quotes for the refuge.  While we were out, we looked for Super Dad and colt, which we did not find today.

We, or rather, Eagle Eye, found a new nest in the Linda Lee Pond.  We figured they may have a nest considering we have been seeing an Unbanded Crane at Sunplex.

It has been a sad day at the Crane Ranch.  Crane #331,  female of the Aunt Alice trio, was found predated by the Interns this morning.  Crane #1409, the Rock Hill Dad, was hit and killed by a car on Gautier/Vancleave Road.  There have been 5 cranes to die this month.

When we arrived to help the Interns pick up the deceased crane, one of the chicks was resting on the ground across the fence. The landowner was standing between the chick and it's Dad to make sure it didn't get in the road.  Shortly after, Mom came back for it and away they went.  

Wednesday Pics:

Thursday we attended the zoom meeting for the Regional Director Awards.  It was nice to have the DGF teams acknowledged.  Go Angie Go!!

We attempted to get the counter data from the trail counters and vehicle counter.  Every last one of them malfunctioned.  We fixed one of them, the others, we will work on another day.  Crazy that they all had a hiccup in the same month.

We checked on Super Dad.  We visualized him way off in the tall grass at the power line, but never got a confirm spotting of his colt.  Fingers crossed that the grass was too high to see him.

When we traveled through the short cut on Browns Trail, we got to see 2 of our favorite cranes, Banana and Coconut.  They were with an unbanded crane walking through a gorgeous bog.

We also saw Super Mom, aka Rock Hill Widow, with her 2 chicks.  Somehow she managed to get them safely back across Gautier Vancleave Road.  Fingers crossed, they won't be crossing that busy road anymore. 

Thursday Pics:

Friday, we went with Jake to check on a couple of crane nests in the South Gautier Unit.  The first nest that we searched for was Perseus #2011, and her mate Twiglet #1115.  We knew the general area the nest was in from the g.p.s. data.  After a bit of searching, we flushed the crane that was on the nest and found that it had 2 eggs.  We floated the eggs and collected nest data.  This is the first crane nest that I have ever found. 

The 2nd nest was Clarabelle #1315, and FT17.  We were hoping to find that it had hatched but it still had 2 eggs on the nest.  Fingers crossed that they are still viable.  Again, we floated the eggs and did nest data collection.

After rehydrating, we went to the Martin's Pasture and found that the MacFarlane's Pitcher Plants are still there.  

We attempted to get a visual on Super Dad and Colt.  We did not see either of them.

We stopped by the Linda Lee nest and confirmed that it was still active. 

We were planning on going to Fontainebleau Trail to work on the counter, when Jake requested our help of catching an injured crane.  We went to the location and found Surge #2109, and his unbanded mate in one of the residents front yard.  This resident had notified Scott of the injured crane and had it in his fenced in back yard.  When Jake got there, we used the net and was able to capture him.  We had a zoom meeting with Scott and Richard, from Audubon Species Survival Center.  After determining the wing was broken, Jake took the crane to New Orleans for further evaluation.  The Crane Ranch is not having a good year.

We checked the DGF tanks and got zero frogs, then relaxed at Camp Crane.  We got in7 hours on our day off.

Friday Pics:

Saturday, RR19, was euthanized.  Very sad to loose our 6th crane of 2023.  We had a bookstore meeting with Lloyd, then met Anita at Island View.  We had another large time of fun, food, and drinks.  We even got a little bit of dancing in!!

Crane Ranch - 5-21-23 - 5-27-23

Sunday, we lounged around the room, enjoying our coffee time with Anita at Island View.  We had a good breakfast at the buffet, then headed westbound to do a little bit of shore birding.  We were looking for Least Tern babies.  We saw plenty of nests, but no hatchlings.

We were entertained by a male Least Tern offering his mate lunch.  He was very proud when she took the minnow from him.  It almost looked like he had a smile on his face.

We donated a little bit of money to the casino then called it a night.  Even though it may have still been daylight outside.

Sunday Pics:

Monday, we did a repeat of yesterday's morning, drinking coffee and eating breakfast at the buffet. Afterwards, we headed eastbound to do a little bit of birding.  We saw a lot of birds at Jones Park.  One pair of Royal Terns were doing their mating dance.  Nature is so amazing.

We finally found a Least Tern hatchling amongst all the other nests.

We made a drive through Hiller Park and saw a Pond Slider.

We made a few more stops before heading back to Island View.  We walked to Sully's for happy hour.  It was a fun place to eat and drink.

We got to spend a little bit of time with Norman and Jason while donating a few more dollars to the casino.

After spending Saturday, Sunday, and Monday night at Island View we made it back to the ranch Tuesday morning.  We got a bit of piddling done around HQ then relaxed for the rest of the day.

Common Box Turtle at the front door of the visitor center on National Turtle Day 

Tuesday Pics:

Wednesday, was back to work day.    

When we went to the South Gautier Unit to do some lopping, we checked on the Firetower Pond nests.  Both nest are still active.

We also got a visual on the Sunplex Dad, aka Super Dad.  He and the colt are doing fine.

Wednesday Pics:

Thursday, we had the West Elementary School outing at the refuge.  We led 3 walks along the Dees Trail.  The kids and the chaperones all seemed to have a good time.

The afternoon, we manned the visitor center and inventoried a new shipment of stock that came in.

Friday, Lauren got a walk in along the Dees Trail then I met him on Crane Lane.  We packed up then were Crossroads bound for a few days to give the place some TLC.

Friday Pics:

Crane Ranch - 5-14-23 - 5-20-23

Sunday, we had a nice time, sitting under the shade tree taking pictures of the fire crew doing a prescribed burn at the entrance of Camp Crane.  They only burned an acre, but that acre was burned with precision.  The Hotshots last day at the Crane Ranch was quite impressive.

 

The afternoon, we went on another orchid safari at G05-S, but did not find any of the elusive calopogon multiflorus.  But we did find Mean Momma on her 3rd nest of this season.  Hopefully, 3 times is a charm!

Sunday Pics:

Monday, I got up early to see Lauren off to Tractor School.  As I was lounging around on the computer after he left, I got an invite to join the class.  It only took me about 10 minutes to be seated in my chair for this 4 hour class.  Driving a tractor is a new challenge for me, but not for Lauren who has been driving them for most of his life.  We will get our seat time of driving tractors later this week.  

Monday afternoon, I did the online training for the Tractor Course while Lauren helped Jake and Theresa process and tag 68 DGFs.  Logan, one of the guys in the tractor class happened to stop at the visitor center as we were heading to Camp Crane.   He went with the 4 of us to release the DGFs at sunset.

As we were walking to the pond, we could hear the rumbling.  Right before we got to the pond, we saw a beautiful rainbow.  

While acclimating the mets, we checked for snakes.  We found one Cottonmouth that we relocated on the way out.  We were pretty lucky that the thunderstorms missed us and we only had a light rain while we were at Justin's pond. 

The new Visitor Services Kubota was sitting in the parking lot waiting for us when we went to work Tuesday morning.  We got in and took her for a spin.  It has an enclosed cab, windshield wipers, air conditioning and heating.  Lauren did a good job picking it out. 

 

This afternoon we helped Carol pack up her things after she turned in her refuge keys.  The Loews will be missed.

Wednesday morning, we got our chick buzz in first thing.  We got to see both of the chicks with their parents at Rock Hill.  

We also checked on the Sunplex Widower.  His behavior led us to believe the chick is still alive, but we could not get a visual on the colt in the tall grass.

We had our first volunteer meeting with Jeremy and Melissa.  During the meeting Melissa announced that she has taken a job at Desoto National Forest.  Yesterday, Carol turned in her keys.  Today Melissa announced she is leaving.  Life at the Crane Ranch is never going to be the same.

Tuesday/Wednesday Pics:

Thursday, before opening the visitor center, Lauren and I walked the Dees Trail.  It is already starting to green up after the prescribed burn and has a few blooms popping out.  We can't wait to watch it progress.

Thunder, Squall, and Tsunami were chowing down at the HQ feeder when we walked to the trail.  That all changed as we were opening up the visitor center and NV11 and 337 flew in and made them skedaddle. 

 

I manned the visitor center while Lauren and Jeff took the Visitor Services SUV in for repairs.  My plan was to get bookstore orders done while they were gone.  That plan changed when I had all these nice folks to talk to about the refuge.  After Lauren and Jeff got back, I got the orders done while they talked with the visitors.

Thursday Pics:

Friday, we sorted and washed the plant markers from the Dees Trail then did our seat time of tractor training.  I thought the big tractor with the bat-winged mower would be the hardest to drive.  I did pretty good on it.  On the other hand, the smaller tractor with the bucket was a lot harder than I thought it would be.  On my first try, I scooped up the gravel, backed up the tractor, then went forward and dumped the gravel. I thought, I got this, but I thought wrong.  After many unsuccessful attempts, Lauren came over and helped me out.  I was finally able to successfully scoop up and move the gravel.  It would have helped to have a working gauge for the bucket.  It would have also helped if the clutch and stick shift were easier to maneuver.  I may have been worn out when I finished, but it was well worth the effort.  We are now Tractor Certified for the US Fish and Wildlife.  Team McLaurin is awesome!!

This afternoon, we walked the Dees Trail and placed a couple of plant markers.  

Friday Pics:

Saturday, we went to see "Lonesome Lilly" at the Pascagoula River Audubon Center, Lauren's entry in their Nature Photography Contest.  She was exhibited above the refreshment table.  Lauren got a nice wooden chopping board for his efforts. 

 

Afterwards, we had an impromptu Crane Tour for Jake and his grandparents.  The tour started off good seeing 3 cranes when we entered the North Gautier Unit.  Although, they didn't hang around for a picture.

We had our first Purple Gallinule sighting on the refuge.  He was hanging around Valentine Pond and very photogenic.

We got a visual on the Sunplex Widower and his colt and for the grand finale we got to see the Rock Hill Family.

 

We were surprised to have 16 Crane sightings considering it was after 12 pm before we left for this impromptu tour. 

This afternoon, we met Anita at Island View for a 3 night stay in our adjoining rooms.  We didn't win any money, but we had a great time.  We even made an appearance to listen to the band that started at 8 pm, although we didn't last very long.

Saturday Pics: