BLACK-NECKED CRANE
The Black-necked Crane is one of the rarest birds on the plateau. CERS has been studying this stately bird since 1988. Research and conservation activities include visits to numerous summer mating and breeding sites on the plateau, as well as to important wintering grounds of the cranes in Guizhou and Yunnan. CERS discovered and documented both the northernmost and southernmost ranges of the Black-necked Cranes. The Society maintains conservation and educational projects involving students at a number of important sites and habitats of these cranes. We also support other Chinese NGOs which have well-focused projects aimed at protecting the birds. In order to understand the cranes’ migration pattern and offer them full protection we are also now tracking the cranes by satellite.

CAPTURING CRANES AT NAPAHAI

Liu Qiang
Napahai, Yunnan - 27 April 2009
Translated by Wong How Man

Affixing equipment on captured craneMigrating birds arrive in the autumn and leave in spring. Where do they come from? Where are they heading to? Would they be coming again next year? Throughout time, this has been a riddle for people with an interest in science or just the romance of nature. Legend has it that 2,000 years ago, a palace consort in the kingdom of Wu tied a red string onto the leg of the swallow to find out whether the same bird would return the following year to its nest above her window.

Napahai is a wetland paradise in Shangri-la of southwest China, bordering the Tibetan plateau. The pristine state of this ecosystem provides an ideal wintering home for the Black-necked Cranes. Every year as weather on the high plateau turns bitterly cold, over 300 Black-necked Cranes migrate from the north to here. As the breeze of spring kisses the new greening grass, farmers begin tilling the soil and sowing barley seeds. These spiritual birds of the plateau, as if hearing a calling from the North, begin their mass migration. Seeing the silhouette of them flying further and further away, we cannot help but ask where they are heading.

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