Three of these rare iconic birds visited Mud Lake in March. Read about conservation of Whoopers and the story of this trio’s migration through the Bog.
Whooping Cranes in the Cedarburg Bog
John O’Donnell
On March 9, 2025, three extremely rare Whooping Cranes spent several late afternoon hours foraging in and around frozen Mud Lake, a stop on their migration back to their home breeding grounds in Wisconsin. Photos taken by Jeff Kurz document only the second time Whooping Cranes have been confirmed in the Cedarburg Bog. The first confirmation was in April 2019 when two whoopers were observed flying to the southwest away from Mud Lake.
Background
Truly an icon, the Whooping Crane is North America’s tallest bird, almost 5 feet tall with a wingspan of 7 to 8 feet. Their name comes from their unique loud “whooping” calls. Adult Whooping Cranes exhibit striking pure white plumage with a red crown, red malar stripe, and black legs.
The North American Whooping Crane is an endangered species. The current total North America population of whoopers in the wild is estimated to be about 750 birds. Prior to European settlement, conservative estimates suggest there were between 10,000 and 20,000 Whooping Cranes in suitable habitat throughout much of North America. By 1870 most, if not all, of the eastern population was gone; and the western population was down to about 1,300 birds. By the mid-1940s, 75 years later, the entire world population was only 21 Whooping Cranes!
Whooping Crane Conservation
In the early 1950s, conservation measures and serious protections were finally enacted to save the few remaining Whooping Cranes in the west. These measures worked well, and today the western migratory flock numbers over 600 birds. In the early 1990s, given the remarkable turnaround of the western Whooping Crane population, attention began to shift towards the possibility of reintroducing an eastern population.
In 2001, it happened! The first wild Whooping Cranes east of the Mississippi River in almost 200 years were reintroduced into the Necedah National Wildlife Refuge in central Wisconsin. That was the beginning of the effort to establish the eastern migratory flock. Thousands of person hours and millions of dollars were spent on various strategies to reestablish the Whooping Crane. One well-publicized innovation involved teaching young whoopers how to migrate south for the winter by having them follow an ultralight aircraft driven by a pilot wearing a Whooping Crane costume. Researchers and ornithologists gradually figured out how to help those first Whooping Cranes colts make the difficult transition from a captive existence to an instinctive life of survival in the wild.
The reintroduction of the “eastern” Whooping Crane actively continues and is slowly proceeding. Nearly 80 wild Whooping Cranes now independently reside in Wisconsin from early Spring through much of Fall. Winter is spent in various southern states. The International Crane Foundation (ICF) monitors the location of each of these birds on a year-round basis via a GPS tracking device attached to one of the bird’s legs.
Whooping Cranes in the Bog
A day after the March 9 Whooping Crane sighting in Mud Lake, the person in charge of Whooping Crane monitoring at ICF, Hannah MacInnes, confirmed that these three cranes were near the final leg of their northern migration. The crane trio spent a number of days with other whoopers on a layover at the Goose Pond Fish and Wildlife Refuge in Indiana. Their last overnight there was on March 7. On the morning of March 8, the trio took off to head toward their breeding grounds in Wisconsin. They made several refueling stops and then overnighted in the Lake County area of northern Illinois. The next day, March 9, the three arrived in the Cedarburg Bog at Mud Lake sometime in the mid-afternoon. They were last seen on Mud Lake at 6:30 pm.
Whooping Cranes on a Frozen Mud Lake, Photo by Jeff Kurz
Shortly after leaving the Bog, they split up and headed in two different directions. The Whooping Crane pair traveled northwest towards Portage County Wisconsin where they had nested and hatched one chick in each of the last two breeding seasons. The single female flew west and overnighted in the Horicon Marsh where she has nested the last two years.
This trio of Whooping Cranes did not stay long at Mud Lake, perhaps because the lake was still solidly frozen, or perhaps because they were in a hurry to complete their migration. It is nonetheless significant that migrating Whooping Cranes have now twice used Mud Lake as a migratory stopover site. The Bog is well-situated as an ecological oasis wetland in the midst of a broad agricultural and urban landscape. As the Wisconsin population of Whooping Cranes continues to grow and expand, one can hope that the day will come when a pair of Whooping Cranes will sweep in, whoop it up, and establish a family residence in the Cedarburg Bog along with the many hundreds of waterfowl, rails, herons, Sandhill Cranes, and other critters who have long called this place home.
