AUSTWELL - Biologists found three more dead whooping cranes on Sunday, making this winter the deadliest on record in the past 20 years for the endangered species.
Twenty-one birds of a flock of 270 have been found dead at the whooping cranes' wintering home in and around the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, said whooping crane coordinator Tom Stehn via his flight report. Stehn, a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, conducts regular aerial surveys to observe the cranes.
The second deadliest winter on record was when 11 cranes from a flock of 146 died in 1990.
Biologists also presume dead 34 cranes that failed to return from the nesting locale at Wood Buffalo National Park in Canada. That means that 55 whooping cranes or more than 20 percent of the flock died during the past year.
The cranes usually start migrating back to Canada at the end of March with most cranes leaving the first two weeks in April. Stehn doesn't know how the poor conditions of the cranes may affect the migration.
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