Edition 44: Autumn 2008

Duncan Butchart singles out some of the continent’s most charismatic and enticing birds, and tells you where to find them. In this edition he turns his trained eye to the crowned crane.

Elegant and long-legged, cranes are celebrated by many cultures around the world. In Uganda they’ve gone so far as adopting the magnificent crowned crane as their national emblem. An understandable decision, considering that this unmistakable bird, which stands over three feet tall and boasts an ornate crest of fine golden plumes, is one of the continent’s most striking.

It’s not only cranes’ fine plumage and stature that wins adulation, it is also their fidelity. All cranes pair for life. And they make a show of it, with elaborate courtship dances at the beginning of each breeding season.

Like other members of its family, the crowned crane is a bird of open country – wild grasslands and remote marshes – where seeds, bulbs and tubers are sought for food. Invertebrates such as grasshoppers, locusts and cutworms are also taken, along with small crabs and frogs. Crowned cranes have adapted surprisingly well to habitats modified by humans, including croplands, irrigated fields, pastures and ranches.

In East Africa, crowned cranes may breed at any time of the year, but in southern Africa they nest at the height of the rainy season. Pairs call in unison to defend their territory and will tango with outstretched wings and raised bills, before copulating. Up to four eggs are laid in a disc-shaped platform of flattened vegetation, which sits among reeds. Youngsters leave the nest at between two and three months, and reach adulthood at the age of three. Outside the breeding season, crowned cranes form flocks that move to seasonally favoured feeding sites.

There are actually two species of crowned crane: the grey and the black. The grey is the more widespread and familiar, ranging from the savannahs and marshes of Uganda and Kenya, south to the Eastern Cape of South Africa. The black crowned crane is a bird of the Sahel zone, from Senegal to Chad, and the Upper Nile River basin in Sudan and Ethiopia, but it has been recorded as far south as northern Uganda and Kenya’s Lake Turkana.

Whether you hear these magnificent cranes honking out their peculiar calls in a secluded East African valley, or glimpse them wandering among Xhosa villagers on the Wild Coast of the Transkei, it will be an unforgettable experience.  

Five places to see a crowned crane
1. Uganda The best chances of seeing a grey crowned crane occur in Uganda, as they are commonly present in most of the national parks, including Queen Elizabeth, Lake Mburo and Murchison Falls, as well as in open country around Kampala and other towns. Kidepo National Park offers a chance of seeing the black crowned crane.

2. Eastern Cape, South Africa A road trip through the Wild Coast region of the Eastern Cape is likely to provide good crane viewing in picturesque pastoral surroundings, which are typically sprinkled with thatched rondavels, or against the backdrop of glorious beaches.

3. Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania This famed crater is home to several resident pairs of grey crowned crane, which are easily approached and might be photographed alongside endangered black rhinoceros or among thousands of lesser flamingos.

4. Pirang, The Gambia About 25km south of Banjul is the village of Pirang. Here, black crowned cranes are resident at a disused shrimp farm on the banks of the River Gambia.

5. Nairobi National Park, Kenya Grey crowned crane are resident in this national park, as well as in small marshes and pastures around the bustling city’s fringes. They are also common and conspicuous in Kenya’s Masai Mara Reserve.

Conservation status
The grey crowned crane, with up to 77,000 individuals, is the more common variety. There are currently some 40,000 black crowned cranes, though their numbers are declining sharply in West Africa, particularly in Nigeria (where it is also the national bird) and Ghana. The wattled and blue cranes are classified as ‘vulnerable’ species by the IUCN due to habitat loss, a blight that has also impacted on cranes in North America and Asia. In rural Africa, the indiscriminate use of pesticides, overgrazing by livestock, and hunting for the pot, are causes of decline.

For more information visit www.savingcranes.org.