A sound equal parts rattle and honk resonated through the Headwaters Outdoor Education Center (HOEC) Building on Sunday, June 23rd.
"You can hear this song from up to a mile and a half away," explained James Anderson, the Naturalist with the Marion County Park District.
James stood in front of a crowd of 52 as he spoke passionately on the endangered sandhill crane.
"These birds look a lot like the blue heron, which most are familiar with," James continued, "however, the sandhill crane can be identified by the crimson patch on their crown, chiseled beak and, in flight, they hold their necks straight out in front of them."
Your average sandhill crane will weigh in the range of 8-10lbs while reaching an incredible four and a half feet tall. These stilted birds prefer grassy areas and agricultural fields that neighbor marshes and/or bogs. They do most of their feeding on invertebrates (insects, gastropods, etc.), seeds and the occasional frog, snake, duckling or small mammal.
Due to overharvesting and habitat disruption, 1926 marked an over 60 year hiatus of the sandhill crane nesting in Ohio.
"There is hope," James went on, "In 1987 the sandhill crane began to nest again in Wayne County. In 2021 there were over 85 nesting pair in Ohio and that number continues to grow!"
James oversees that annual Sandhill Crane Count in Marion County each spring in coordination with the Ohio Bird Conservation Initiative. The count takes place over a single 2 hour time period on a Saturday in April. The data collected from this survey will be used to track the migration, population status and nesting habits of this bird as it returns to native brooding territories.
Headwaters Outdoor Education Center's very own Mia Shotwell carried the presentation forward with information on the work that goes into placing organisms into a conservation status.
"A Threatened species is close to being endangered,. Endangered species are close to extinction," Mia explained, "We live in a world that is in a delicate balance. When we disrupt that balance the living things around us take the hit."
The International Union for Conservation created their widely adopted "Red List of Threatened Species" nearly 60 years ago. The arrangement from most distressed to least is as follows Extinct, Extinct in the Wild, Critically Endangered, Vulnerable, Near Threatened, and Least Concern.
"There are lots of reasons species end up in one category or another. Fred and Wilma were seized from a home and greatly malnourished," Mia affectionately referring to the two ambassador eastern box turtles on a table near her.
The eastern box turtle is listed as vulnerable do to habitat fragmentation, road strikes and illegal keeping. It is important to note, that while in the past it was a common practice, Ohio Administrative Code 1501:31-25-04 clearly states that "...It shall be unlawful to take any reptile or amphibian... from the wild in Ohio except bullfrogs, green frogs, snapping turtles and softshell turtles."
Mia then spoke about the little brown bat, a 2.5-4 inch long member of the genus Myotis. These bats have suffered a severe decline in recent years due to a fungal disease known as white-nose-syndrome. Entire colonies of little brown bats have been discovered to have succumb to this disease in a single hibernation cycle. The fungus had likely traveled on clothing that had been unwashed between cave visits in two different parts of the world.
"Arriving in winter and gliding above cleared ground is the grey ghost!" Mia said with a smile gesturing toward a photo of a Northern Harrier, "this raptor arrives in the winter to hunt rodents in open fields, a real benefit to agriculture!"
The Northern Harrier suffered in the decades following the wide adoption of heave-metal pesticides. As rodents picked up the toxins left in the fields so to did the Harrier by eating the rodents.
Mia and James used hope to bridge the gap with the crowd.
The work of conservationists have lifted the conservation status of both the trumpeter swan and the bald eagle in the twenty-first century.
"I would have never believed I would have been able to see so many wild bald eagles in my adult life, they were nowhere when I was a kid," Mia exclaimed, "we can save these species. We just have to care."
The event concluded with a short question and answer period and a meet-and-greet with Fred and Wilma.
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