Fox in the Crane House
The other night WC was at Creamer’s Refuge, photographing birds, and encountered Sandhill Crane behavior he hadn’t seen before.
There are still 100-125 Sandhill Cranes on the refuge. A few stay to breed, and some individuals will remain all summer and not bother to breed; they might be subadults. Most will leave, but just haven’t left yet.
There’s also a Red Fox on the refuge this spring, and it has been hunting smaller birds. This Red Fox got what appears to be a Pacific Golden Plover or a Black-bellied Plover. It’s hard to tell. But the Cranes were extremely unhappy about it. They were honking, hopping and flapping their wings and then, in a group of 25-30, rushed the Red Fox. They weren’t entirely happy about approaching a predator, but in this photo you can see some fly-hopping, some running and some hesitating. But collectively, they were attacking or bluffing an attack on the fox. And you can see the fox is not happy about it either. His posture is submissive, and his ears are down.
(Note: it was pretty late, the light was pretty bad and these photos aren’t great. And they are pretty steeply cropped. This was all happening a couple of hundred meters away.)
Sandhill Cranes Harassing Red Fox with a Prize
The fox eventually decided to make a break for it, and sprinted directly towards WC. The Cranes followed, driving the fox away, but not attempting to get ahead of it.
Cranes Herding the Fox Away
Unfortunately, about half a second after this photo, the fox saw WC and his camera, as did the cranes, and whole pattern of behavior changed. The big guy with the camera might have been seen as more dangerous than the fox, WC supposes, because the chase broke off, the fox dodged into the woods and the cranes returned to feeding.
It’s interesting that the cranes responded cooperatively to the threat of the predator, driving it off. If any naturalists have wandered over to this blog, WXC invites their observations.
Oh, yes, this is typical behavior for such flocking birds as cranes. I have also seen geese do similar behaviors. You were lucky to be witness to this small drama. And to capture it on film, as well.
Kate McLaughlin
May 27, 2012 at 8:22 am
Last Saturday, I arrived at the ABO Migration Station to hear a similar story from the staff and volunteers. The fox was hunting for breakfast and this flock of Cranes followed him all over the field disturbing his hunt. How great that you caught this event on camera. I’m also curious as to why the Cranes are exhibiting this behavior.
Nicole Pearce (@ArcticGarden)
May 27, 2012 at 9:16 am
Your photos are great. LOVE that last one.
akglow
May 27, 2012 at 11:59 am
Although having lived all of my 72 years in Alaska and much of that in remote regions, I really haven’t witnessed something like this, with one exception. And, of all places for that to occur was right here in mid-town Anchorage. After getting out of my truck one afternoon, I hear a shrill and weird racket. It was approaching our area from the south. Soon, well over a hundred, whirling, diving, screeching, mew gulls filled the sky. In the middle of the melee was a bald eagle, with a catch, looked like another mew. As with your fox, the eagle just hunkered down, landed near the top a huge cottonwood close to the house and began eating his prey. The gulls kept up the attack, for maybe an hour. The noise was so deafening that traffic on
Tudor, maybe 300 feet away, started slowing or stopping to see what was going on.
twaharpies
May 28, 2012 at 4:43 pm
Good documentation and good reporting as well. I’ve never seen anything like this in the wild.
richditch
June 1, 2012 at 6:49 pm