Sandhill Crane Photo courtesy Byron Wright New Mexico Cooperative Extension Service.
Sandhill Crane Photo courtesy Byron Wright New Mexico Cooperative Extension Service.
One Friday morning in late February, Richard and I headed to Columbus, New Mexico, to see sandhill cranes. A man who lives just east of Columbus had written to tell me about a flock of 2,000, he guessed, that spent winter days feeding in the milo fields near his house. I was amazed. I knew that sandhills once wintered all along the Rio Grande valley, but I had no idea that any wintered near Columbus, in the desert on the Mexican border, some 65 miles west of El Paso.

We took the back road to Columbus, a two lane highway that follows an abandoned railway line along the international border, through miles and miles of wild, wonderfully lonely desert. We saw golden eagles, coyotes, and desert cottontails, and when we finally reached my correspondent's house just east of Columbus, sandhill cranes.

From several miles away, we spotted great swirls of cranes in the air over the fields. As we neared his house, we could see hundreds of the gray, long-necked and long-legged birds picking their

way through the straw-colored stubble. When we stopped and rolled down the car windows, the wind brought us the purring murmur of thousands of sandhill voices. Cranes probed the soil for insects and seeds with spearlike beaks, cranes jumped and bowed on long, graceful legs, cranes preened iron-gray feathers, cranes took to the air on wide wings as we drove slowly along the fields. After an hour of careful counting we estimated that we'd seen at least 4,000 sandhill cranes. What an unexpected surprise!

As we drove away, our host mentioned that farmers were starting to plow the milo stubble under in the fall instead of letting it stand through the winter. No stubble means no cranes. He pointed to the neatly-plowed fields across the road, bare of stubble, bare also of cranes.

For hundreds of years, farmers throughout the Southwest welcomed the cranes' arrival each year. They saw the crowds of tall birds as a gift, a winter blessing.

Indeed, they are. A flock of feeding cranes cleans the soil of overwintering insect pests; their droppings add nutrients to the soil, fertilizing the fields. Nowadays, cranes also bring tourists - and money. Each winter, tens of thousands of visitors travel to the Bosque del Apache to see the cranes there.

Most importantly though, these tall birds bring less tangible benefits: they add beauty and wild grace to our agricultural landscapes. Who among us is not moved by the sight of thousands of cranes stalking with long-necked grace, leaping upwards in ballet-like dance, or stretching enormous wings into regal flight?

Surely our world still includes a place for the gift of wintering cranes.