What Ya Hear Is What Ya Get

Sandhill Cranes

It was a loud, resonant rattling; an almost wooden tonal quality honk. As author David Sibley describes it, a rolling bugle sound. My first thought was that I was about to take a spot between the dead deer and the two squashed raccoons along Ohio Route 95 in Wayne County. I was birding the Funk Bottoms Wildlife Area in hopes of finding the elusive Cackling Goose (or geese) recently reported in the area.
Yesterday I contacted birder Su Snyder who knows the area as well as anyone. She said she’d not seen the geese, however, there were plenty of birds in the area … Okay, that was incentive enough. I was off.
So, there I was, shivering in the 34 degrees, snow swirling all around, wind dancing with my anemometer to the tune of 40 miles per hour in gusts, in the middle of the highway because there was no place else to stand and now some truck driver wants me to move? Couldn’t he see I was laden with binoculars, spotting scope and camera? Some people!
I looked in the direction of honking and saw nothing. Then I looked up. Four Sandhill Cranes, landing gear extended, were right over my head! Fortunately, no one was there to see me fumbling with my binoculars trying to take a photo, realizing that in my excitement I’d grabbed the wrong gadget, then stumbling to get out of the road in case a truck did come along, nearly strangle myself with the multitude of straps around my neck, trying to stop laughing long enough to make a photo. Birding ain’t for sissies.

I avoided stepping on the already flat raccoon and managed to get the spotting scope into a secure spot. The cranes (Were they laughing?) circled and landed in a huge flock of Northern Pintail ducks about 200 yards away. The ducks exploded in a roiling dark cloud and burst of high-pitched whiney quacking.
Then my world went black! Oh shit, I’d forgotten to take the lens cap off. Probably the first time I’ve ever done that trick. Right.
Two of the four cranes took off about as quickly as they landed. The other pair danced around a bit and also left, heading north, into the snowy afternoon.
I was left with the deafening silence created by hundreds of Tundra Swans and thousands of ducks.