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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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!!
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