Thirty minutes with a sandhill crane baby

Mom, I'm bored.

Oooo, that's a scary looking bug.

Mom, come this way.

Mom, I don't see it!

Mom, don't push me out of the way.

I'm a big girl now.

I feel like I usually don't get this lucky. A couple of weekends ago, on my trip to Homosassa Springs Wildlife Park with my sister, a sandhill crane baby had been born a few days before. A volunteer told me the parents are 3rd generation cranes that were born at the park from a permanently injured crane that lived there years ago. A wild mate found the resident crane and took up residence with it. The ones born since then can come and go but usually stay. This little baby was so cute and curious. It was running around looking at everything but not straying too far from the parents. Sandhill cranes are born in a nest low on the ground instead of in a tree. Unlike smaller birds who have to spend many weeks growing up in the nest first, the sandhill crane baby is usually mobile within a day or two of being born. The parents start grazing and are on the move within the first day. I must have walked around the big bird enclosure for at least 30 minutes. Finally, I had to run off and find my sister who had long moved on.