Tennessee and Florida Students Learn About Whooping Cranes

Like Gilchrist Elementary in Tallahassee, FL, many schools along the eastern crane flyway have been learning about Whooping Cranes this fall and winter. As the young Whooping Cranes completed their first fall migration through the eastern United States, ICF's Outreach Coordinator, Joan Garland, visited schools to share stories and updates on the migration and Whooping Crane conservation. Following are three images from Joan's school visits in Tennessee and Florida. If you would like to share photos or updates from your classroom activities, please email your images and stories to trackingcranes@savingcranes.org.

A student models a crane costume, designed to hide the human form from young Whooping Cranes, at Citrus Springs Middle School, Citrus Springs, FL.

Students learn about Whooping Cranes at McCallie Elementary School, Chatanooga, TN.

Joan and a student volunteer explain the use of the crane costume at Hammett Bowen Elementary School, Ocala, FL.

Gilchrist Elementary Celebrates Arrival of Whooping Cranes to Florida

This week we return to our crane flyway in the eastern United States to celebrate the Florida arrival of the 14 ultra-light led Whooping Cranes in the Class of 2008. We received an email from Gilchrist Elementary School in Tallahassee, Florida, who shared how they are welcoming the Whooping Cranes to neighboring St. Mark's National Wildlife Refuge. The students, with the aid of artist Dan Dancer from "Art For the Sky" created a Whooping Crane image on their school grounds by standing together in the shape of a crane (each dot on the crane's body is a student or teacher wearing white or black - also notice the students forming the border around the crane!). Photo by Bob O'Lary

The Gilchrist student's art is an important reminder of our responsibility to protect the wetlands that the Whooping Cranes depend upon in Florida and along the entire flyway north to Wisconsin. On February 2, students throughout the world will celebrate World Wetlands Day, an annual celebration supported by the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands (an international treaty for wetland protection). The theme of this year's celebration is "Upstream-Downstream: Wetlands Connect Us All." Click here to download a World Wetland's Day poster, brochure, do-it-yourself frog, 20 questions for kids and teachers, and wetlands comics.

Ramsar has also released a new video, “Wetlands: keeping our planet alive and well." The long version is about 4.5 minutes, and the short version is about 1.5 minutes. The files are in QuickTime .MOV format (click here to download the free QuickTime software). Click on he links below to view the video (you may need to wait a few moments while the video is downloading, but it should start playing automatically if you have QuickTime on your computer).

Long version English (30MB) http://www.ramsar.org/ramsar_video_2008_long_e.mov
Short version English (12MB) http://www.ramsar.org/ramsar_video_2008_short_e.mov

Long version Spanish (30 MB) http://www.ramsar.org/ramsar_video_2008_long_s.mov
Short version Spanish (12 MB) http://www.ramsar.org/ramsar_video_2008_short_s.mov