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Crane count classic: Capturing the history of the early years [1]
['Wisconsin Wetlands Association']
Date: 2023-04
By Karen Voss
I encountered my first Sandhill Crane in the spring of 1973. As a first-year graduate student and an ornithology teaching assistant, I was weak at the knees with my inexperience, yet loving every minute. George Archibald and Ron Sauey, recently of Cornell University, were just establishing the International Crane Foundation (ICF) on the northern outskirts of Baraboo, WI.
Few researchers studied Sandhill Cranes until the early 1970’s, when a small Wisconsin explosion of interest and advocacy for cranes and wetlands occurred. Archibald began extensive field surveys, hoping eventually to initiate a wild population of Whooping Cranes in Eastern North America. At UW–Stevens Point, Ernie Gluesing, a wildlife biology graduate student under Dr. Lyle Nauman, surveyed the state’s population and estimated a total of about 850 Sandhills. On the heels of Gluesing’s research came the work of several more of Nauman’s graduate students, all working to better understand the ecology of Sandhill Cranes.
Meanwhile, Jim and Libby Zimmerman’s fight in 1969 to protect wetlands from a freeway expansion in Madison marked the beginning of what was to become the Wisconsin Wetlands Association (WWA). Under the Zimmermans’ guidance, WWA became a broad-based organization working on education and advocacy.
By the mid-1970’s, the common interests of ICF, WWA, Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, and wildlife researchers began to coalesce into a collaborative effort. With ICF’s encouragement, and with guidance and advice from graduate student Alan Bennet, a high school teacher and his class counted cranes in Columbia County. With that first citizen survey effort, the need for more “eyes on the sky” and “feet on the wet ground” became evident.
After graduation from UW-Stevens Point in 1977, Charlie Luthin worked at ICF, assisting with early citizen survey efforts. The beginnings of the Crane Count began to take shape in 1978, with a collaborative planning effort involving WWA, Madison Audubon Society, and ICF. Five counties were surveyed that year: Columbia, Sauk, Dane, Dodge, and Jefferson.
Luthin began graduate school at UW-Madison in 1979 and became active in Madison-based WWA. With Charlie’s leadership, WWA agreed to take over the lead responsibility for the Crane Count, freeing ICF to spend time on other valuable research.
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[1] Url:
https://www.wisconsinwetlands.org/updates/crane-count-classic-capturing-the-history-of-the-early-years/
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