Liz Antliff-Clark's blog

Hello Crane fans and Happy New Year to you!

Hello Crane fans

Hello Crane Fans

Great news to start the year with.  The 2021 breeding season resulted in 15 fledged juveniles joining our Somerset flock.  An excellent outcome and beyond expectations.  The  young cranes are still with their parents and observed regularly settling in to their environment.  Another first is that none of the originally released birds went missing last year.  That is certainly a relief.  The Annual Report is now uploaded to the website under the 'News' tab and you can read all the details there. 

Hello Crane Fans

Apologies to those of you who are wondering why no news has been posted for quite a long time.  Well, the breeding season is full of incident and has its ups and downs in terms of what’s happening.  Good news can be followed by less happy news and it can be quite a rollercoaster. So news is best broadcast when the situation is more settled.

Hello Craniacs

The breeding cranes in Somerset have had a very good year in 2019 and the seven fledged juveniles continue to thrive.  If you want to find out more you will find details available for each of the released birds on the crane profile pages. You can find the individual profiles by clicking on "Cranes > Meet the Cranes".  The information is correct up to the end of September.

The 2018 breeding season is now over and there is very good news from West Sedgemoor.  Three pairs produced three youngsters now fledged and in the photograph you can see two of them in flight.  Additionally the pairs who have chosen to stay at Slimbridge have also produced 3 youngsters, now fledged.  It has been a very good year for breeding attempts though not all have been successful.  Hop

Great excitement here in Somerset!  At last Spring has arrived and our cranes are busy finding territory and preparing to nest. A few pairs are already sitting.  The persistent winter left many possible nest sites flooded so a late start was inevitable but since Easter the birds have been making up for lost time. It should be a good year and we are keeping everything 'crossed' for them.  The photo is of one pair calling together in their territory.