By Vernon Robison
Moapa Valley Progress
The Overton Wildlife Management Area (OWMA) located just south of downtown Overton is hosting a rather unusual guest this winter. And it has captured the attention of people from all over the southwestern United States.
A couple of weeks ago, a birdwatcher touring through the OWMA caught sight of a bird which is rarely seen in this hemisphere: the Common Crane. While it is common to the wetlands of northern Europe and Asia, the Common Crane is hardly common here in southern Nevada; or anywhere on the American continent for that matter. In fact, this bird species rarely ever comes here.
The Common Crane breeds in the far north in parts of Europe and western Asia. It is a long-distance migrant which usually winters in Africa or southern Europe.
Nevertheless this single Common Crane appeared a couple of weeks ago at OWMA along with five Sandhill Cranes, a species that is a much more common visitor to these parts.
“Every once in a great while, a Common Crane will hitch up with a group of Sandhill Cranes like that and end up migrating down the wrong side of the globe,” said John Shipley of Phoenix, Arizona during an interview on Wednesday afternoon. Shipley had driven up from Phoenix the day before just to catch sight of the bird.
He had read about the unusual sighting on the internet and wanted to see it for himself.
OWMA Warden Tim Wood said that bird watching traffic in the area had increased over the past couple of weeks as word about the Common Crane had spread. He said that he had talked to visitors from California, Arizona, Utah, Nevada and even one as far away as Texas; all who had come just to see this bird.
The only problem for the bird-watching visitors was that they were arriving in the midst of the waterfowl hunting season. The OWMA holds hunting days every other day throughout the waterfowl season.
“It’s tough when they’ve come all that way and they show up on a hunting day,” Wood said. “You have to explain that they have to wait until tomorrow to do their birdwatching because there are hunters out there. They usually aren’t too happy about that.”
The Common Crane is expected to be in the area for only a short time before it heads back north. It can be seen best at a distance by using a regular pair of binoculars. It is gray overall with a black face, chin, throat and neck and it shows a patch of bare red skin on the crown. It will be seen among the group of Sandhill Cranes with which it has travelled. The main discernible difference between the Common Crane and the Sandhill Crane is the broad white stripe which extends from behind the eye down the back of the neck of the Common Crane.
