Sometime when we are young we learn that birds fly south for the winter.  So I’ve known that somewhere deep in the recesses of my mind, but haven’t really contemplated it or given it much thought.

Yet when we went to Bosque del Apache outside of Socorro, New Mexico that very principle is live and in your face.  Thousands of sandhill cranes, white geese, canadian geese, and other waterfowl fly from Alaska – south, to Bosque del Apache wildlife refuge.

 

 

Even though it was a ‘light’ year for the birds flocking to Bosque, it was still a sight to see, watching these numerous birds of all different kinds spiraling into the ‘crane pools’.

We watched them early morning (6 am sunrise) and evening (5pm sunset) as they would ‘lift off’ and go to safe ground in the ‘crane pools’.  During the day they would flock to the farm fields and feed off the grass.  It was definitely good cheap entertainment.