70 
BIENNAL REPORT 
As to the nesting places being objectionable certainly no one would want to 
live in immediate contact with one of these noisy, noisome spots. They are in the 
nature of things unsightly and foul smelling on close approach and all that can 
be done is to leave the birds in sole possession. If the locality happens to be 
too valuable to be thus disposed of, the birds need not, and should not, be destroyed 
for they will quickly move elsewhere as soon as man obtrudes his improvements. 
When the bit of woodland chosen by the herons is designed for future building, 
the complaint may be brought by the owner that valuable trees are being killed 
by the excrement of the birds. This is true so far as the trees occupied by many 
nests are concerned but these are few in number and on the whole little real 
damage results. To the rapidly increasing number of people who, in these days, 
are exerting every effort to preserve what is left of the wilderness and the wild 
creatures that dwell therein, it seems little short of vandalism to destroy one of 
these never-to-be-replaced centers of bird activity, which are so full of interest 
and fascination to the great body of nature lovers. 
CRANES. ( Gruidae ). 
Both the Whooping and Sandhill Cranes formerly bred commonly throughout 
the prairie regions of the state and the Sandhill occasionally in large marshes in 
the wooded portion. Just when the Whooping Crane ceased to nest in Minnesota 
is uncertain but it is fair to assume that it disappeared as a summer resident at 
least 20 or 25 years ago. It is now so nearly extinct as a species that it is rarely 
seen anywhere. The last record for Minnesota, which came as a surprise, was 
of a pair that alighted near Badger, Roseau County, on the 23rd of April, 1917. 
Unfortunately one of these rare birds was shot. It was brought to Mr. P. O. 
Frykland of Badger for mounting, from whom this information was obtained. 
As late as June, 1880, the writer found a pair of Sandhill Cranes nesting in 
the great marshes in southeastern Anoka County, within sound of the whistles of 
the saw mills at Minneapolis. In June, 1901, when the region of Mud Lake, eastern 
Marshall County, was explored by a Minnesota Zoological Survey party under 
the leadership of L. O. Dart, the Sandhill was still breeding in that then Paradise 
of water birds. How much longer they may have continued to nest in the state or 
whether an occasional pair still remains in some remote spot is unknown. As 
migrants they are at present seen, spring and fall, passing over the state in wedge- 
shaped flocks of no great size. Twenty years ago they were extremely abundant 
in migration as witness the following written by H. J. Jaeger from Walnut Grove, 
Redwood County, in 1899: “April 9th (of that year) the Sandhills began to arrive 
here and for about two weeks the country was flooded with them. Sometimes 
hundreds would congregate in a pasture or meadow just like a large flock of 
sheep.” Such scenes have now vanished from this state and brief as is the period 
since then, only a remnant of these great flights is left—or at least comes this way. 
Cranes build their huge nests on heaps of broken down vegetation or old 
muskrat houses, far out in extensive marshes where they have a wide range of 
vision all about them. They feed on the upland as well as in the marshes and 
their diet is very varied—small fruits, roots, succulent vegetation, grasshoppers 
and other insects, frogs, tadpoles, snakes, small rodents, young birds, eggs, etc. 
The food is swallowed whole and the indigestable portion regurgitated in the 
form of a bolus as is usual with birds that bolt animal food entire. When the 
