The Great Crane Project is an attempt to reintroduce this majestic bird back into the UK. To find out more visit:
The Great Crane Project
The Great Crane Project on Flickr
Cranes and people
from RSPB
Cranes have enchanted human beings for millennia
- They figure in prehistoric cave paintings
- Homer wrote of their exhilarating sound in the Iliad (first bird mentioned in western literature - 4000 BP)
- Roman folklore explains that the god Hermes invented writing when he saw the letter shapes made by flying cranes
- Cranes were once believed to carry other bids on their back during their long migrations
- the word 'geranium' is from 'geranos', the Greek for crane, as the plant's seedpods resemble the birds' heads
- the word 'pedigree' derives from the French phrase pied de grue, 'foot of a crane', as family trees look like the birds' feet
- Cranberries are thought to be named after cranes
- They stand upright and are tall, elegant and beautiful
- They are very sociable animals, and once paired, are loyal and attentive partners and parents
- Cranes have well-developed communication systems including over 90 physical gestures and sounds
- Cranes dance: they use elaborate choreography to develop social skills when young, and for courtship when older. In a flock, if one bird begins to dance, all the others join in: leaping and bowing and kicking, often tossing skyward small objects they pick off the ground
- There is evidence of imitative human crane dances from as long as 9,000 years ago, from Australia and many countries in Asia, Africa, Europe and North America.
- They are one of the the longest surviving bird species (they have been on earth for around 9 million years)
- They are the tallest (sarus cranes reach over 6 feet; our species stands at between 4-4.5 feet and are Britais's tallest bird species)
- They are the loudest (their calls travel over distances of three miles)
- They are the highest flying of all birds (they reach altitudes of 32,000 feet)
