Description
An adult Whooping Crane is white with a red crown and a long, dark, pointed bill. Immature Whooping Cranes are cinnamon brown. While in flight, their long necks are kept straight and their long dark legs trail behind. Adult Whooping Cranes' black wing tips are visible during flight.
The species can stand up to 1.5 meters (5 feet) and have a wingspan of 2.3 meters (7.5 feet). Males weigh on average 7.3 kg (16 lb), while females weigh 6.2 kg (14 lb) on average (Erickson, 1976). The body length averages about 132 cm (52 in). The standard linear measurements of the Whooping cranes are a wing chord length of 53–63 cm (21–25 in), an exposed culmen length of 11.7–16 cm (4.6–6.3 in) and a tarsus of 26–31 cm (10–12 in). The only other very large, long-legged white birds in North America are: the Great Egret, which is over a foot shorter and one-seventh the weight of this crane; the Great White Heron, which is a morph of the Great Blue Heron in Florida; and the Wood Stork. All three other birds are at least 30% smaller than the whooping crane. Herons and storks are also quite different in structure from the crane.
Their calls are loud and can carry several kilometers wide. They express "guard calls" for warning their partner about any potential danger, the crane pair will jointly call ("unison call") in a very rhythmic and impressive way in the early morning (after waking up), after courtship and for defending their territory. The first unison call ever recorded in the wild was taken in the Whooping Cranes' wintering area in the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge in December 1999 and is documented here
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