While in Yellowstone NP last month I spotted a couple of brown spots along the Yellowstone River. I pulled into a turnout and asked my wife to photograph it. She said photograph what? I pointed in the general location and she took several pictures. When we returned home from our trip I started downloading pictures and found those. I looked and at first couldn’t figure out what they were. The first picture is the one with the brown spots I saw.
The second pic will get you curious.
The third and fourth are about as stretched as I could get them and still maintain some semblance of focus. After looking at them I had to go to wikipedia and type in large birds of Yellowstone to learn what they are. Anyone want to guess or do you know? By the way, the small brown blob to the left of the bird in the last photo is a baby (Colt) of the couple.
Sandhill cranes
Look like sandhills.
Tim
My guess would be sandhills also but can’t quite say for sure, can’t see the red on top of their heads.
Yep. Sandhill cranes is what I came up with. I was thrown off by the brown bodies. I then read that the Yellowstone sandhills preen their body feathers with mud, giving them a brownish color. As for the red on the faces, probably distance or lighting blotched that out. I have never seen sandhill cranes as large as these. The ones I saw during migration across western Texas in the '60s were a lot smaller and grayer in color. Yellowstone sure has some cool animals. Jim
I believe I have a couple of closer shots when I was up in the park in 07. I’ll see if I can find them. They are beautiful though.