raising whooping cranes

Acrylic on panel

21.25″ x 16″

When your job is raising whooping crane chicks, you have to dress the part. To prevent the captivity-raised chicks from identifying with humans so they may have a chance at being released in the future, their care takers teach them how to be cranes while dawning a crane suit that obscures the human form and includes a pointy wing and puppet crane head. 

The whooping crane is one of North America’s most endangered birds. In the 1940s they numbered in the mere 20s. Since then, a dedicated contingent of individuals and institutions has nurtured the species from the brink of extinction to a number of around 830 today. There are two primary migrating flocks. One travels between Alberta and Texas, and the other between Wisconsin and Florida. The amount of effort, resources, and care dedicated to the birds is immense. 

Besides being a cautiously optimistic success story, what intrigues me about the cranes and the people that care for them is the confluence of developing and testing methods of care, the myriad technologies used, the geography the cranes span, and the moments of serendipity that inject joy into an otherwise likely tragic tale. It’s so easy to lose a species and incredibly difficult to bring it back. The complex web of actors, environments, and events provides so much to explore.