Sandhill Cranes

We arrived in Kearney Nebraska to try and view the migrating Sandhill Cranes around 3ish on Sunday, March 11. First we checked into a motel and then we had dinner at Whiskey Creek- recommended by Matt who hails from Kearney and absolutely despises Sandhill Cranes with an unhealthy passion- which was very good. I had a Jim Beam marinaded steak which although good, pails in comparison to the average steak that Russ brings camping with him and that generally gets cooked over an open fire. After dinner it was off to the public viewing area at Fort Kearny State Recreation Area.

The Sandhill Cranes are interesting in that they winter and summer in many different locations, but nearly all of them meet in the Sandhills of Nebraska in the spring and fall to stop, have a break, get some food and inevitably party in the middle of their migrations.
The weather on Sunday was wonderful, but as the evening wore on, it got progressively chillier. We were able to bundle Corwin up satisfactorily, but I remained a bit cool. The cranes were supposed to show up at around 6ish, but they didn't arrive until 7:15ish. We nearly gave up on them, but another fellow told us to stick around as there was a large flock in a field just over over a couple of hills. We waited it out and got to see many formations of birds flying above us. Without exaggerating I would guess that there were at least 10 t0 20 thousand birds in the sky. They never did land in the river near enough to us to get any good pictures, unfortunately.
The next morning, it was cold and rather foggy. We got to another public viewing site at around 6:30 but never did see anything other than some light ghostly cranes flying overhead. You'll notice the cool hat I'm wearing. It's an old Mack Trucks stocking cap from my youth that I found in my folks house this year. It was a present from my father from when he must have been close to my age.
Later we went to Rowe Sanctuary and saw many cranes flying over the river. Corwin had a grand time playing on the path to the viewing blind. Rowe gives out guided tours to viewing the Cranes in the evening and morning, but Corwin is still too young to go on one of these.


After leaving Rowe we cruised a couple of gravel roads where we saw a truly impressive flock of cranes hanging out.
We crept up slowly on them and watched for a good minute before they all suddenly took to wing.
At first we thought that these birds have really slow reactions if they are just now running away from us. But then, we too heard the train whistle in the background. The trip was worthwhile, but also a bit disappointing. I really wanted to see the dance that Sandhill Cranes are known for. But we got some good intel for the next trip. I think that our best bet will be to have someone baby sit Corwin and Baby overnight so Anke and I can rent a blind and cabin. We also need to get a telephoto lense for out DSLR.

A special thanks goes out to Maurice for allowing me to borrow his Jeep. That allowed Inga, Andre, Anouk, Corwin, Anke, myself and all our gear to travel to the middle of Nebraska in one vehicle, making the trip much simpler.

Robin

I saw what must be the first robin of spring yesterday. Or a bird that was simply too stupid to fly south for the winter. It was perched on a branch outside the kitchen window, puffed up like a little gray and orange ball. The robin says it is spring, but the snow on the ground says it isn't.

There are deer sleeping in my back yard

I'm not sure how I feel about that.

Home

You ain't no kind of man if you ain't got land. - Delmar O'Donnel (O Brother, Where Art Thou?)

I am on my way to becoming some kind of man. Anke and I signed a contract to buy a house today. Hooray! We hope to close at the end of January. We'll be located in Bellevue - which is just south of Omaha- near Fontenelle Forest. My commute to work will probably grow from 15 minutes to 20 - 25 minutes. And there is no covenant. I've had this discussion with friends before about how I don't believe in covenants. And it's usually me against everyone else in this, but I believe in personal freedom over property values. I believe in hanging engine blocks from trees . And I now have a tree (see the above picture) to hang one from. Just do me a favor and don't tell Anke about this plan. I'm not quite sure she would understand, and she may attempt to thwart me.
The back yard goes right up to this public hilly foresty land. There should be lots of wild life for nature geeks like me and Anke to enjoy.
The inside is very nice with high vaulted cedar ceilings and an open floor plan. The master bedroom is decent sized, but smaller than we have now. Our current apartment actually has huge bed rooms. The two kid bedrooms are rather small to my eye. But that is ok, because kids are small people. And I won't be the one living in the small room. Oh, and there is a wet bar in the basement. The back of the house is the really cool part. Look at those huge windows! Anke and I are really excited about this house. It will be a bit stark with furnishings in the beginning, but we think we can be happy living here until Corwin gets out of school. So that'll give us plenty of time to decorate. (Photos a borrowed from the real estate listing.)

Broken Kettle Grasslands

Last Sunday - 2006-11-29- we took advantage of the unseasonable warm weather and went looking for Prairie Rattlesnakes in Broken Kettle Grasslands, just north of Souix City.We found this little guy first. He is your average Bull Snake, but an exceptionally pretty one in my opinion.He thought he was a vicious little critter though.Yellow Bellied Racer
The Loess HillsCorwin found the land managers yellow lab more interesting than the snakes.We found 4 Prairie Rattlers and caught 3. I say we, but I didn't do any actual catching as I had Corwin on my back. Plus I'm more than a bit scared of the pit vipers, so I leave the handling of them to friends with experience, skill and the proper equipment. The snakes were measured, had the GPS locations where they were discovered recorded. The two smaller snakes were also pit tagged so that if they were caught again in the future the data could be appended to their record. The larger rattlesnake pictured had been previously pit tagged in 2001.

Black Squirrel

I'd never seen a black squirrel before moving to Omaha a few years ago. I've since developed a -perhaps unhealthy- obsession with them since. As some of you may or may not know, if I had to be a rodent, I would choose to be a squirrel. And preferably a black one. They are rather rare here as I have only seen one in my neighborhood, across the street. One in Memorial Park, and one in West Omaha. I'm sure there are more, but these are the three individuals that I can account for. I spent about 40 minutes stalking the one in the park on Saturday.

This grey/red squirrel was chasing our black friend first. Then he turned the tables.I'm not sure how many trees that I followed him through, but I was amazed at the ground he could cover without touching the ground.

More HDZ

One of the nice things about living somewhere that isn't Centerville is that there are things to do. We have an annual pass to the zoo, so whenever Corwin is bored we like to stop by. Many people who visit the zoo try to see the whole thing in one go, but I don't like this. It can really wear you out, like going to a museum. By the end of the day, you're tired and not really enjoying yourself, but by damn you paid full admission and you're going to see everything. But because I visit the zoo two or three times a month I stroll along taking my time watching the exhibits that I really enjoy, getting passed by most everyone.

When we got the to the Desert Dome today, we saw our friend Andrew in the Sun Room. I don't remember his exact title, but he is the number 2 man in charge of reptiles in the Desert Dome. He invited us in and showed a couple of interesting things, before he had to go investigate some tree that fell over somewhere. He showed us a three day old gecko that was rather cute. And Corwin got introduced to a Black Something Something Snake. Andrew described it as a poor man's Indigo Snake. Corwin wasn't afraid at all and wanted to touch her, but even though she wasn't poisonous it would have hurt had she bit him. But she was a rather nice and calm snake.

The Sign Doesn't Lie

This morning we took a field trip to Fontenelle Forest. It is a nice place with several miles of trails. It has a several mile long boardwalk for those who don't want to dirty their shoes, or perhaps would rather skateboard through the woods. They had signs that said no bicycles (sorry Billy) or horseys (sorry Mom), but I found no signs prohibiting skateboarding. Alas, I haven't skateboarded since my teenage years. Plus we didn't spend much time on the boardwalk.

When we arrived it was still cool, but the humidity was killer. As the morning wore on the temperature rose, yet the humidity stayed very high. When Anke was a young lass, she went hiking in the jungles of Indonesia. Before the Muslim radicals started acting crazy, wanting to blow up all westerner's. It wouldn't be so safe for you and I to go there now. Sad really. But I digress. Back when it was safe, Anke was there. She said the Indonesian jungles got nothing on a Nebraskan forest when it comes to humidity. So it was hot and sweaty and sticky. The little free loader even got sweaty just riding around in a backpack.

We followed one trail that crossed some railroad tracks and led down to the Missouri river. I believe that technically Fontenelle Forest Nature Association lands ends before the tracks. But the trail clearly went down to the river. The mighty mo was as brown as ever. By the river we heard a train coming, so we decided to walk up and watch it. Generally trains slow down for metropolitan areas, so you rarely see them zooming along. But this Amtrak train was officially zooming. I tried to wave at the conductor, but I'm not sure if he actually saw me.

What is herping...

... Kim wants to know. The precise answer is: Looking for reptiles and am- phibians in the wild. Generally it involves watching, photographing or catching and releasing the little critters.Anke and I take it beyond actual reptiles into insects and birds and butterflies and mammals and pretty much anything else that interests us in nature. Maurice was telling me about how he was on his farm a couple of weekends ago, just hanging out in his field one morning. He was sitting on the ground and looked between his knees and there was a butterfly. He thought to himself, "This is a perfect Scotty and Anke moment. Except that they would have a camera and take a picture of it." But I digress. Mostly herping is about lizards and snakes.

How did I get here? It all started out as a basic interest in lizards and snakes and frogs as a little kid. And I never really grew out of it. I had a newt first. I named him Isaac. He lived for quite a long time, for a newt. I kept him in a fist bowl with small rocks and one big rock. Dad had to fashion a wood and screen top for the fish bowl as our cats took an unhealthy interest in him. Unhealthy for Isaac, not necessary for Midnight or Jettero. Through the years I had several other lizards, culminating in a basilisk and an iguana. They lived for a while, but not as long as they should have. I was too young, and didn't properly understand the care that they require. I was really too irresponsible. I feel a bit of guilt about that now, I should have taken better care of them. I was probably around 11 or 12.

Then more than a decade went by and I didn't have any lizards, but I kept an interest in them. Anke and I went to western Colorado and eastern Utah (Canyonlands) in maybe 97 or 98 for hiking and camping. While there I photographed all of the little lizards that I could find. This was me herping, before I knew what herping was.

Later in 2001, just after we were married, Anke let me get a lizard for my birthday. We decided on a getting a Chinese Green Waterdragon. We found a nice litter of them at Petco so we purchased Loki there.

Afterward we joined the Nebraska Herpetological Society. Which is basically lizard and snake club. We met many interesting people through the herp society. Zoo keepers at Henry Doorly Zoo. Professors from UNL and UNO. And a grad student, doing her thesis on the ecology and conservation of the Massassauga.

It is with these cool people that we have done most of our herping. We've gone with Tracy (the grad student) to radio track Massassauga's. They are a relatively small rattlesnake with venom that will not kill you (unless you are Corwin, Kelton, or Jadon sized.) On other occasions we've found prairie rattlesnakes and timber rattle snakes and looked for copperheads. We haven't yet found the copperhead in the wild yet, but I put this down to bad luck. But these guys can kill you and me with a bite. But we go with people who are very cautious and know what they are doing. I never get too near the rattlesnakes. But every rattlesnake found has its location recorded using GPS. It is then weighed and checked to see if it has a radio identification tag. If it doesn't one is inserted into the snake, so if it is found again the data can be reattributed to the same snake.