Rare Bird Sighted in Beaglesonia

 I saw a whooping crane in our marsh the other day, and have been spending most of my internet time looking them up since then.  I have been reading Uncle Ken's posts, but I have been finding it difficult to focus on police brutality with whooping cranes on my mind.  No really, this is a big deal!  You're talking about a snow white bird that stands five feet tall and hasn't been seen in these parts for a century or more.  

Whooping cranes have been brought back from the brink of extinction in our lifetimes.  Once extant throughout North America, the surviving population in the 1940s was 15 to 20 birds that nested in Canada and wintered in Texas.  My Audubon Field Guide to North American birds, published in 1977, lists their number at 50.  According to the International Crane Foundation, the current population as of 2019 stands at 849, including 500 in the original flock and some 150 birds in captivity.  The crane I saw probably strayed from a migratory contingent of about a hundred birds that nests in central Wisconsin and winters in Florida.  This group was re-introduced in Wisconsin about 20 years ago, and was taught how to fly to Florida by a guy in an ultralight aircraft made up to look like a giant crane.  I am not making this up!  I know there was a fictional movie like that about geese, but the movie people got the idea from the real crane plane, not the other way around.  Unfortunately, the FAA subsequently banned this technique, but the Wisconsin cranes had already learned their lesson and have been making the trip on their own every year since. 

In answer to your question Uncle Ken, the way you talk to a policeman is the same way retail clerks and customers talk to each other.  Okay, the way they're supposed to talk to each other: friendly but not overly familiar, and neither condescending nor obsequious.  Also, you probably should have thanked those cops who pulled you out of that burning car.  They likely didn't expect you to do that in the condition you were in at the time, but a nice note to their supervisor or the local newspaper afterwards would have been appreciated.