ICF’s captive Whooping Cranes are laying eggs – breeding season is here!
A tradition at ICF is to follow our “Egg Score Card,” which tracks the Whooping Crane eggs from our captive flock, as well as wild Whooping Crane nests in Wisconsin. We’ll be posting updates to our score card on our website, Facebook, and Twitter pages, so check back often in the coming weeks to view our progress. Click here to learn how we raise Whooping Crane chicks at ICF.
Join us for our monthly Chick Chats with ICF’s aviculture staff. Click here to request an email reminder for our upcoming chats or replay any of our past chats. Our next chat:
August 28 (12-12:30 pm CDT) Preparing for Release. Join our aviculturists for our final chat to learn how we prepare our Whooping Crane chicks for release into the wild.
Whooping Crane eggs laid/hatched at ICF (Final update 6/18/14)
Total eggs: 54 (the highest number of Whooping Crane eggs laid at ICF in a single year!)*
Fertile: 23 (of this total, 12 have been shipped to the Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Maryland; 5 were not viable embryos)
Infertile: 19
Broken: 12
Hatched: 7 (6 from ICF’s flock; one from the Eastern Migratory Whooping Crane population) – Each year we have a naming theme for our chicks, and this year’s theme is condiments! The names chosen to date are: Tabasco, Pico de Gallo, Honey, Aioli and Cholula. We have lost two chicks – Sweet Baby Ray’s and Sriracha.
*In addition, ICF has received 12 eggs from the Eastern Migratory Whooping Crane population in Wisconsin: 10 fertile (5 viable), 2 infertile. Four of the viable eggs were shipped to Patuxent (all hatched), along with 12 fertile eggs produced at ICF (11 hatched, one was a late dead embryo).
Wild Whooping Crane chicks in Wisconsin (7/23/14)
The wild Whooping Crane chicks of the year have hatched! The first chick hatched May 8 at the Necedah National Wildlife Refuge (Juneau County, Wis.) from pair #9-05/13-03 (read our update on the first hatch). Thirteen total chicks hatched in the wild, with one currently remaining as of late July:
#12-02/19-04 – 1 chick (W3-14)