Tag Archives: nebraska

First Prescribed Fire of the Season

Posted on by
14

To be perfectly honest, this post is mainly to build my own morale.  Last week, we were finally able to squeeze off our first prescribed fire of the season.  Typically, we get several good windows of opportunity during the month of March, but this year it was late in the month before the combination of wind, temperature, and relative humidity all lined up – and even then it was a very short window.  We woke up to temperatures in the mid 20’s and a couple hours after we wrapped up the fire we had thunder/lightning and sleet.  However, between late morning and mid-afternoon, we had very nice conditions for a prescribed fire.  It looks like that will be the only fire we get done in March – we have snow on the ground again, and while temperatures are forecast to rise toward the weekend, the wind speeds are too, making it unlikely we’ll burn again until at least next week. 

Looking at these photos from our successful first fire helps distract me from the list of other fires we’re still waiting to complete during the next couple of weeks (not to mention the long list of later-spring fires that will follow!)

The cold overcast conditions of the morning gave way to mostly sunny skies by early afternoon, which warmed and dried the grass and helped it burn more completely. For this fire, our burn crew size was bolstered by the addition of several staff from the nearby U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Refuges office.

Our objective for the fire was to remove the thatch/litter from approximately 1/3 of the 175 acre prairie as part of our patch-burn grazing management. Beginning in early April, this site will be grazed by cattle, at a light/moderate stocking rate. Those cattle should graze the burned patch fairly intensively, while leaving the unburned patches largely ungrazed.

 

As the fire unit was finally ringed, a big plume of smoke rose into the air. Because our Platte River Prairies are near Interstate 80, we have to be very cautious about keeping smoke away from highway traffic. On this day, we had two things in our favor - the excellent lifting of the smoke (because of heat of the fire and the unstable atmosphere) and the east winds, which kept the smoke off of the Interstate to our north.

As the fire consumed the remaining grass inside the unit, our crew extinguished the last flames along the edges. We then began the long process of mopping up, which in a grazed prairie primarily means raking smoking piles of dried manure away from the edges of the fire unit. As we mopped up, we watched the half a dozen Swainson's hawks which, attracted by the smoke, had come to feed on the voles and other small mammals that were too slow to find new cover as they escaped from the fire.

Sandhill Cranes on the Platte River

Posted on by
20

For those of us living and working on the Central Platte River in Nebraska, the birds that signify spring’s arrival are much bigger than robins.  The annual arrival of sandhill cranes (we usually see the first ones around Valentine’s Day) lets us know that winter is coming to a close.  When the last crane leaves in early April, the first wildflowers in the prairies aren’t far behind.  This spring, the skies along the river are already criss-crossed with formations of flying cranes, intermixed with the ducks and geese of numerous species.  If you’ve never seen this unique phenomenon, you’re missing out on one of the greatest wildlife events in the world.  Come out to the Platte and start your spring right!

Every March, more than half a million sandhill cranes - the entire mid-continent population - converge on the Platte River in central Nebraska. Each bird spends about three weeks feeding and building fat reserves for the rest of their northern migration and the grueling nesting season.

In the evenings, the cranes come to the river itself to roost overnight. They favor broad channels with abundant bare sandbars where large groups of cranes can congregate in large noisy masses of up to 50,000 or more. As the sun starts to go down, wave upon wave of sandhill cranes drop gracefully into the river like so many floating dandelion seeds.

Not surprisingly, this wildlife spectacle draws bird watchers and nature enthusiasts from around the world. Crane watchers can drive rural roads to watch the cranes in the fields and meadows during the day, and stand on riverbank platforms (or reserve space in viewing blinds) to see them come to the river at night. Besides cranes, visitors to the Platte in the spring can also see millions of ducks, geese, and other waterbirds.

The cranes spend the night standing on bare sandbars or in shallow water. Their noisy calls eventually subside enough that they get some sleep, but it's rare that the entire group is quiet for long - and any disturbance (real or imagined) can quickly set the birds to calling and shuffling nervously about again.

In the morning, the cranes leave the river and head to nearby meadows and cornfields to feed. On some mornings, the birds seem reluctant to leave their roost, choosing instead to loaf, feed, and even bathe in the shallow water. Other mornings, a foraging eagle or roving coyote can push an entire roost site into flight simultaneously, and the sound of many thousands of wings creates a deafening noise.

Besides the important task of feeding, cranes spend much of their day - in meadows and along the river - socializing.

Courtship behavior is common during the day, and can include elaborate dances with much leaping and ducking of heads, as well as stick tossing.

As March comes to a close, cranes start heading north to breed - mostly in Canada, but also as far north as Siberia. They usually leave on sunny days with a nice south wind to carry them. Cranes can average 35 miles per hour and travel 200-300 miles per day (up to 500 with a good tailwind). In the fall, they pass through the Platte in small scattered groups (we usually just hear them flying overhead) - providing us with just a quick glimpse of them, but a reminder of what we'll see at the end of the coming long winter.

To learn more about how and where to see sandhill cranes in Nebraska, visit this or other websites.  If you come out, feel free to stop and stretch your legs at the hiking trails through our Platte River Prairies.

To see the best portfolio of sandhill crane photos in the world, visit Michael Forsberg’s website and look for his book “On Ancient Wings“.