“Welcome Siberian Cranes to their wintering area in Kuixiang, Guangdong Province” by Long Baichuan

If a picture is worth a thousand words, an image of a crane is visual poetry. Cranes are beautiful and elegant large wading birds found on every continent except South America and Antarctica. East Asia has the largest number of crane species in the world, with nine of the 15 species. Cranes also have special cultural significance in East Asia, especially in China, South Korea and Japan. However, cranes continue to face increasing threats, including climate change, habitat degradation and loss, human disturbance, and are at risk of population decline or even extinction in the wild.

On the afternoon of March 16, 2018, a man riding his motorcycle along the bank of the Liao River near Shenyang, Liaoning Province, was surprised to see a flock of large white birds across the river. He stopped and used his mobile phone to take photos, but the noise alarmed the birds, which took flight. Not far away, a group of volunteers was also watching these birds. They were conducting a synchronized migration survey of the white birds – Siberian Cranes.

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]In October 2019 our Vice President International Asia – Spike Millington introduced 2020 as the “Year of the Cranes” at the International Workshop on Crane Conservation in East Asia convened in Beijing, China. Read more about the workshop. The campaign aims to leverage public, political, and financial support for crane and wetland conservation.