After five days of being confined to a hospital room, the openness of the San Luis Valley in southern Colorado was just what the doctor ordered. I am here to see the sandhill cranes, but I’m just happy to be outside, no walls between me and the world-- this high altitude valley that stretches hundreds of miles, bordered by the Sangre de Cristos on one side and the foothills of the Rocky Mountains on the other.
The light today has a special clarity, as if everything was illuminated: the sharp silhouettes of the birds as they ascend in ever higher circles into the clouds, looking like flecks of dazzling mica in the sky; as they fly directly over my head in a precise formation; or come down for a landing, their long legs dangling as they tilt to catch the wind and land perfectly upright.
With my feet planted on the ground, my head faces upward, turning in every direction, as I hear the honking of the cranes’ cries before I see them. Flocks come from all corners of the valley, crossing each other in the ever widening sky. Surely, I think, they will crash into each other, but they never do, as I try to steady myself against the wind that wants to carry me off, too, were it not for my too solid body.
Even on the ground, the cranes play with the air currents, letting the wind carry them for short distances, as if they were enjoying this free ride across the fields. Or they stretch out their wings and leap off the ground, letting the wind buoy them in the air for a few minutes.
Down on the ground with us earth-bound humans, the cranes mostly focus on eating, their heads down to peck grains and other goodies out of the dirt. That gives us the opportunity to admire their soft gray feathers and the brilliant red patch above their eyes, to hear their soft murmurings. I notice their alertness and vigilance as dozens of cranes turn their heads in the same direction, as if hearing something we can’t.
But almost as dazzling as the cranes today are the clouds, as strong winds that herald a coming snowstorm push and pull apart the clouds, forming and reforming them into shifting shapes; one resembles a giant question mark. So turbulent are the winds that I can hardly keep up with all the new cloud formations across this blue palette, as my eyes constantly roam this sky.
Just as turbulent are all the changes I’ve seen in the more than 30 years I’ve been making this annual visit to the Monte Vista Wildlife Refuge. The row of willows, which once provided cover as we watched the cranes fly overhead, is gone, with the dead trunks scattered on the ground. One of the main crane-watching spots for decades was closed off after the birding crowds got too large and was replaced by a huge parking lot. Worst of all, several ponds that in years past were filled with cranes and Canada geese are gone, victim of a warming and drier climate.
It's hard to imagine that climate change could drive these cranes away, because this species has been making this migration every spring and fall for millions of years, when the fields would fill naturally with water as the snow melted, thus providing safe cover. But now agriculture is draining the aquifer below the valley, and warmer winters and less snow mean the ponds are drying up.
So every year now, I must rejoice, that the cranes have returned. From the sound of their cries and their joyful flights, I imagine they feel the same way.