Animal Diversity Web

Ge­o­graphic Range

There are six main lo­ca­tions of pop­u­la­tions of An­thro­poides virgo. A sta­ble/de­clin­ing pop­u­la­tion of 70 to 100,000 in­di­vid­u­als is lo­cated in east­ern Asia. In cen­tral Asia, there is a sta­ble and in­creas­ing pop­u­la­tion of 100,000 in­di­vid­u­als. Kalmykia is the third east­ern pop­u­la­tion, which con­sists of 30 to 35,000 in­di­vid­u­als, and this count is presently sta­ble. North­ern Africa holds a de­clin­ing pop­u­la­tion of fifty in­di­vid­u­als on the Atlas Plateau. The pop­u­la­tion of about 500 in­di­vid­u­als near the Black Sea is de­clin­ing, and in Turkey, there ex­ists a small breed­ing pop­u­la­tion of less than 100 in­di­vid­u­als. Demoi­selle cranes are a cos­mopoli­tan species found within the wide range of the Ethiopian, Palearc­tic, and Ori­en­tal re­gions. As demoi­selles are mi­gra­tory birds, their win­ter habi­tats in­clude those of North­east­ern Africa, Pak­istan, and India. ("Demoi­selle Crane", 2000; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

• Biogeographic Regions
• palearctic
• oriental
• ethiopian

• Other Geographic Terms
• cosmopolitan

Habi­tat

Found pri­mar­ily in open spaces with a wide range of vis­i­bil­ity, A. virgo lives in up­land areas, un­like most other cranes which can be found in wet­land habi­tat. Space and soli­tude are im­por­tant for the main­te­nance of demoi­selle cranes, there­fore their habi­tats vary from semi-arid sa­van­nas, grass­lands, and steppes, to high plateaus. They can also in­habit semi-deserts to true deserts as long as water is avail­able within 200 to 500 me­ters. Rang­ing in habi­tat from sea level to 3,000 me­ters, they are usu­ally found no far­ther than a few hun­dred me­ters away from rivers, for they need the source of water to sur­vive. After mi­gra­tion, the win­ter­ing habi­tats of A. virgo in­clude aca­cia sa­van­nas, grass­lands, and ri­par­ian areas. ("Demoi­selle Crane", 2000; "The Demoi­selle", 1999; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

• Habitat Regions
• tropical
• terrestrial

• Terrestrial Biomes
• desert or dune
• savanna or grassland

• Other Habitat Features
• agricultural
• riparian

• Range elevation

  sea level to 3,000 m

  to ft

• Range depth

  N/A (low) m

  (low) ft

Phys­i­cal De­scrip­tion

Gen­er­ally, cranes are large birds, rang­ing from a length of 90 cm to 150 cm. An­thro­poides virgo is known to be the small­est crane, with an av­er­age adult length of 90 cm. Cranes are rec­og­nized for their long necks and legs, their stream­lined bod­ies, and long rounded wings. Demoi­selle cranes can be dis­tin­guished by spe­cific phys­i­cal fea­tures and other unique char­ac­ter­is­tics. Most cranes have bare, red skin patches on their heads, how­ever, demoi­selles have a com­pletely feath­ered head with a white line that ex­tends from the cor­ner of their red eye, to the back of their head. Dur­ing dis­play, they can elon­gate these feath­ers on the sides of their head. With feath­ery gray areas rang­ing from the crown to the nape, the bird has a dark un­der­side, with black legs and toes. The main dis­tin­guish­ing fea­tures of A. virgo are their short toes and bills. Adapt­ing to run in the grass­land habi­tat, the toes have evolved to be shorter, as the shorter bills can forge for food more ef­fi­ciently in up­land areas. The length and po­si­tion­ing of the tra­chea can also dis­tin­guish a demoi­selle crane from other cranes; Demoi­selles have a tra­chea that makes a slight in­den­ta­tion on the ster­num.

After hatch­ing, demoi­selle chicks are sil­ver gray, and as they de­velop into a ju­ve­nile demoi­selle, they be­come pre­dom­i­nately grey at the time of fledg­ing. This color as­sists in cam­ou­flag­ing the bird. Once de­vel­op­ing into an adult, they ap­pear as pre­vi­ously de­scribed above. An im­por­tant fact about A. virgo is that the male and fe­male are monomor­phic - iden­ti­cal in their ex­ter­nal fea­tures; how­ever, the males are usu­ally larger. ("Demoi­selle Crane", 2000; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

• Other Physical Features
• endothermic
• bilateral symmetry

• Sexual Dimorphism
• sexes alike
• male larger
• ornamentation

• Range mass

  2000 to 2700 g

  70.48 to 95.15 oz

• Average length

  90 cm

  35.43 in

• Range wingspan

  51 to 59 cm

  20.08 to 23.23 in

• Average basal metabolic rate

  I could not recover any information on the Basal Metabolic Rate cm3.O2/g/hr

Re­pro­duc­tion

The mat­ing sys­tem of A. virgo is monog­a­mous. A male and a fe­male will re­main a pair for their en­tire lives. How­ever, this re­mains true only if re­pro­duc­tion is suc­cess­ful, and re­pro­duc­tion is usu­ally not suc­cess­ful until the age of four to eight years. The breed­ing sea­son of demoi­selle cranes co­in­cides with the local rainy sea­son, and usu­ally takes place in the Eura­sion Steppes from the Black Sea to North­east­ern China. ("Demoi­selle Crane", 2000; Ellis, et al., 1996; Johns­gard, 1983; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

• Mating System
• monogamous
• cooperative breeder

Duets and vo­cal­iza­tions are ex­trav­a­gant mat­ing be­hav­iors of A. virgo. To begin, the bond be­tween two in­di­vid­ual cranes is formed in non-breed­ing flocks or in mixed flocks out­side of the breed­ing sea­son. This bond can be cre­ated rapidly, or it can take months of in­ter­ac­tion. Vo­cal­iza­tions have a crit­i­cal role in the in­ter­ac­tion, de­vel­op­ment and main­te­nance of pair bonds. De­vel­oped be­tween the ages of two to three years, demoi­selles have the abil­ity to vo­cal­ize uni­son calls. These calls last from a few sec­onds to a minute, and they allow the part­ners to come into a breed­ing con­di­tion at the same time. Uni­son calls also are im­por­tant for the ovar­ian de­vel­op­ment of the fe­male. When vo­cal­iz­ing a uni­son call, demoi­selle cranes have a dis­tinct pos­ture where both of the in­di­vid­u­als call with their wings closed, al­though the fe­male calls with her bill pointed up­ward, and the male calls with the bill held hor­i­zon­tally. Uni­son calls are used to help de­fend mates and in­di­vid­u­als along with var­i­ous other threat pos­tures and ac­tual at­tacks. Within the pair, the male main­tains a role of de­fense, while the fe­male deals with more do­mes­tic af­fairs.

Ini­ti­ated by ei­ther sex, A. virgo also per­form a dance be­fore cop­u­la­tion. This courtship dance strength­ens the bonds be­tween mat­ing pairs and syn­chro­nizes sex­ual re­sponse. Demoi­selles are more en­er­getic and more bal­let-like in their danc­ing com­pared to other cranes. Their courtship dance con­sists of long, in­tri­cate se­quences of bows, leaps, runs, short flights, and the pick­ing up and throw­ing of ran­dom ob­jects into the air. Spec­ta­tor demoi­selles will often join in these dances - cir­cling the pair, danc­ing, and tak­ing to flight. ("Demoi­selle Crane", 2000; Ellis, et al., 1996; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

• Key Reproductive Features
• iteroparous
• seasonal breeding
• gonochoric/gonochoristic/dioecious (sexes separate)
• sexual
• fertilization
• oviparous

• Breeding interval

  These cranes breed seaonally, on average producing one clutch. Little is known of the possibility of producing more than one clutch. Growth seasons are so short that there would be little time to fledge a second clutch in time fore the preperation for migration.

• Breeding season

  Breeding is seasonal, and directly coincides with the local rainy season. The nesting period has a duration of three to five months.

• Average eggs per season

  2

• Average eggs per season

  2

  AnAge

• Range time to hatching

  27 to 29 days

• Range fledging age

  55 to 60 days

• Range time to independence

  8 to 10 months

• Range age at sexual or reproductive maturity (female)

  4 to 8 years

• Range age at sexual or reproductive maturity (male)

  4 to 8 years

The cycle of re­pro­duc­tion has many stages. First, there is a three to five month nest­ing pe­riod, whereas the non-breed­ing pe­riod is much longer. Mi­grat­ing be­tween breed­ing grounds and win­ter­ing grounds, when in the breed­ing sea­son, these birds nest in grass­lands. Usu­ally the nest is on the bare ground con­sist­ing of a few twigs and peb­bles. On av­er­age, the clutch size of a demoi­selle crane con­sists of two eggs that are yel­low-green in color with spots of laven­der. Both sexes as­sist with the in­cu­ba­tion of the eggs over a pe­riod of twenty-nine days, how­ever fe­males per­form the major part of the task. Pro­tect­ing their nest, demoi­selle cranes will chase dogs, foxes, and ea­gles with­out hes­i­ta­tion and will even re­ceive help from sev­eral other birds to drive in­vaders away from the nest.

After the eggs hatch, a fledg­ing pe­riod lasts for fifty-five to sixty days up­land areas. This is the short­est fledg­ing pe­riod out of all other cranes. Until the next breed­ing sea­son, for eight to ten months im­ma­ture cranes re­main with their par­ents. After the Ju­ve­nile cranes leave their par­ents, they col­lect into non-breed­ing flocks and are no­madic, forg­ing for food and roost­ing sites dur­ing the breed­ing sea­son of the sex­u­ally ma­ture adults. A young crane starts to ex­hibit adult like so­cial be­hav­ior after eigh­teen months, and pair­ing can begin to occur, how­ever re­pro­duc­tion is usu­ally not suc­cess­ful until the demoi­selle crane is four to eight years of age.

As dis­cussed above, in­cu­ba­tion lasts for a du­ra­tion of twenty-seven to twenty-nine days, the fledg­ing pe­ri­ods lasts from fifty-five to sixty days, and it is well up to eight to ten months be­fore the ju­ve­nile crane is in­de­pen­dent from his/her par­ents. Demoi­selle cranes, like all cranes, ex­hibit a pro­longed pe­riod of parental care. This care pro­ceeds di­rectly after hatch­ing, where bill touch­ing is ini­ci­ated by the chick, and fre­quently per­formed be­tween chicks and par­ents. As­so­ci­ated pos­si­bly with di­rect feed­ing or beg­ging, bill touch­ing takes place for the chicks are fed by both par­ents. As the male typ­i­cally takes the lead, fol­lowed by the fe­male and chicks, grad­u­ally the adults lead the young to the food sources (rather than sup­ply­ing them). The par­ents also pro­vide pro­tec­tion for their young when en­e­mies are en­coun­tered. As­sum­ing an ag­gres­sive pos­ture as­so­ci­ated with in­tense threat, breed­ing demoi­selles will utter alarm calls while di­rectly at­tack­ing the enemy, or at­tempt­ing di­ver­sion­ary dis­plays while mov­ing away from the nest. (Ellis, et al., 1996; Johns­gard, 1983; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

Lifes­pan/Longevity

In cap­tiv­ity, the longevity of demoi­selle cranes is at least twenty-seven years, though records do exist of par­tic­u­lar cranes liv­ing a life of more than sixty-seven years! The lifes­pan of A. virgo in the wild is un­known presently. The mark­ing of in­di­vid­u­als for iden­ti­fi­ca­tion has been ini­ti­ated only re­cently. Be­cause life is more haz­ardous in the wild, the longevity of a demoi­selle crane is pre­dicted to be shorter than one liv­ing in cap­tiv­ity. ("Demoi­selle Crane", 2000; Ellis, et al., 1996)

• Range lifespan
  Status: wild

  27 (high) years

• Average lifespan
  Status: wild

  unknown years

• Range lifespan
  Status: captivity

  67 (high) years

• Average lifespan
  Status: captivity

  27 years

  AnAge

Be­hav­ior

An­thro­poides virgo is both so­cial and soli­tary in be­hav­ior. Be­sides the fun­da­men­tal ac­tiv­i­ties of sleep­ing, walk­ing, eat­ing etc., these birds are soli­tary when per­form­ing the ac­tiv­i­ties of preen­ing, bathing shak­ing, stretch­ing, scratch­ing, ruf­fling, and feather paint­ing. How­ever, in re­sponse to other cranes and other ex­ter­nal stim­uli, demoi­selles are very so­cial. Form­ing bonds and mat­ing with one other in­di­vid­ual for life, and form­ing flocks for mi­gra­tion and so­cial­iza­tion are key fac­tors of their so­cial be­hav­ior. Elab­o­rate danc­ing and a plethora of vo­cal­iza­tions are ex­ten­sive forms of com­mu­ni­ca­tion among these so­cial birds, which is fur­ther de­scribed under the com­mu­ni­ca­tion por­tion of this species ac­count.

Di­ur­nal in their habits, through­out the day demoi­selle cranes for­age, preen, nest, and at­tend to their young dur­ing the breed­ing sea­son. Dur­ing the non-breed­ing sea­son, these birds so­cial­ize within flocks. At night, roost­ing pro­vides se­cu­rity, as they rest on one leg with their head and neck tucked under/on a shoul­der.

Demoi­selles are mi­gra­tory birds, and will fly at high al­ti­tudes, and travel long dis­tances be­tween their breed­ing and win­ter­ing grounds. Be­tween Au­gust and Sep­tem­ber, A. virgo will col­lect into flocks of up to 400 in­di­vid­u­als and will mi­grate to their win­ter ranges. As they fly, their head and neck are ex­tended straight for­ward as the feet and legs are length­ened di­rectly be­hind. They gen­er­ally pre­fer to mi­grate at low al­ti­tudes, but al­ti­tudes of 16,000 to 26,000 feet are reached by some demoi­selles that mi­grate through the Hi­malayan Moun­tain passes to their win­ter­ing grounds in India. These cranes can be found flock­ing with Eurasian cranes in their win­ter­ing grounds; al­though, they do main­tain sep­a­rate so­cial groups within these larger flocks. Dur­ing the months of March and April, A. virgo flies north again to their nest­ing grounds. The flocks dur­ing this re­turn­ing mi­gra­tion only ranges from four to ten birds. More­over, through­out the breed­ing sea­son, these cranes feed in the com­pany of up to seven cranes. ("Demoi­selle Crane", 2000; Ellis, et al., 1996; "The Demoi­selle", 1999; Johns­gard, 1983; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

• Key Behaviors
• terricolous
• flies
• diurnal
• motile
• nomadic
• migratory
• solitary
• territorial
• social

• Range territory size

  10 to 100 km^2

Home Range

Home ranges vary from 100 to 1000 kilo­me­ters through­out Palearc­tic, Ori­en­tal, and Ethiopian re­gions. (Meine and Archibald, 1996)

Com­mu­ni­ca­tion and Per­cep­tion

An­thro­poides virgo has elab­o­rate meth­ods of com­mu­ni­ca­tion vo­cally, and vi­su­ally. The voice of demoi­selles is low and raspy, and has an ex­ten­sive reper­toire for com­mu­ni­ca­tion that de­vel­ops at an early age. There are sev­eral vo­cal­iza­tions that these cranes will make, in­clud­ing: con­tact calls, stress calls, food beg­ging calls, guard calls, lo­ca­tion calls, pre­cop­u­la­tory calls, flight-in­ten­tion calls, alarm calls, and the well known duet of the uni­son call. All of these vo­cal­iza­tions are cru­cial for the ini­ti­a­tion, de­vel­op­ment and main­te­nance of a pair and for the so­cial in­ter­ac­tion and sur­vival of the in­di­vid­ual bird.

Vi­sual com­mu­ni­ca­tion is equally im­por­tant. As men­tioned ear­lier, the spec­tac­u­lar danc­ing of demoi­selle cranes, is very con­ta­gious among flocks, and can be a dis­place­ment ac­tiv­ity when ner­vous, or the per­for­mance of a courtship dance (See "Re­pro­duc­tion"). Other forms of ex­pres­sion in­clude: threat pos­tures, hiss­ing, tail flut­ter­ing, feather ruf­fling, crouch­ing, rigid strut­ting, rit­u­al­ized preen­ing of the back of the thigh, flap­ping, stamp­ing, and growl­ing. Ap­pear­ing ge­net­i­cally de­ter­mined, these dis­plays are not learned so­cially from the in­struc­tion of the par­ents or other cranes. How­ever, the ob­ject at which the dis­play is ori­ented around is learned, and if a young demoi­selle is more ha­bit­u­ated to hu­mans or other species, these dis­plays will be di­rected more to­wards them. ("Demoi­selle Crane", 2000; Ellis, et al., 1996; Johns­gard, 1983; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

• Communication Channels
• visual
• acoustic

• Other Communication Modes
• duets

• Perception Channels
• visual
• tactile
• acoustic
• chemical

Food Habits

For­ag­ing dur­ing the morn­ing and the early af­ter­noon, A. virgo are gen­er­al­ists and op­por­tunists with re­spect to their diet and for­ag­ing be­hav­ior. With more ef­fi­cient shorter bills and toes for feed­ing in dry up­lands, crop­lands, and pas­tures, these birds hunt with their heads low­ered to peck at the ground. Fur­ther­more, demoi­selle cranes are om­ni­vores, con­sum­ing a wide va­ri­ety of plant ma­te­ri­als year round, and sup­ple­ment­ing their diet with other an­i­mals. More specif­i­cally, demoi­selles can be con­sid­ered: car­ni­vores, in­sec­ti­vores, mol­lus­ci­vores, fo­li­vores, fru­gi­vores, grani­vores. Pre­cisely, their diet in­cludes: seeds, leaves, acorns, nuts, berries, fruits, waste grains, small mam­mals, birds, in­sects, worms, snails, grasshop­pers, bee­tles, snakes, lizards, and ro­dents. ("Demoi­selle Crane", 2000; Ellis, et al., 1996)

• Primary Diet
• omnivore

• Animal Foods
• birds
• mammals
• reptiles
• insects
• mollusks
• terrestrial worms

• Plant Foods
• leaves
• seeds, grains, and nuts
• fruit

Pre­da­tion

Lit­tle is known about the preda­tors of this species. Lit­tle in­for­ma­tion is avail­able re­gard­ing the preda­tors of demoi­selles other than those species that threaten the breed­ing ter­ri­tory of these cranes. An­thro­poides virgo are fierce pro­tec­tors of their nests, and will at­tack ea­gles (Aquila), and bus­tards (Otis tarda), and will give chase to foxes and dogs. Man can also be con­sid­ered a preda­tor, for even though hunt­ing of this species is il­le­gal, in areas with lack­ing re­sources, ex­cep­tions are made. In­for­ma­tion on anti-preda­tor adap­ta­tion, be­hav­ior, and struc­ture, is sparse also. As men­tioned pre­vi­ously, demoi­selle cranes have nu­mer­ous com­mu­ni­ca­tion be­hav­iors that as­sist in pro­tect­ing them from preda­tors, such as var­i­ous threat pos­tures, vo­cal­iza­tions, vi­su­al­iza­tions, the mod­i­fi­ca­tion of the bill and toes for more ef­fi­cient feed­ing and run­ning, and the sil­ver-gray col­oration of the ju­ve­nile crane for cam­ou­flage, as well as their eggs that are yel­low-green with laven­der spots. ("Demoi­selle Crane", 2000; Ellis, et al., 1996; Johns­gard, 1983; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

• Anti-predator Adaptations
• aposematic
• cryptic

• Known Predators

  • bustards (Otis tarda)
  • domestic dogs (Canis lupus familiaris)
  • foxes (Vulpes)

Ecosys­tem Roles

As gen­er­al­ist om­ni­vores and po­ten­tial prey items, A. virgo in­ter­acts with many other species. Ad­di­tion­ally, demoi­selle cranes are hosts to par­a­sites of var­i­ous ne­ma­todes such as the Gape­worm, Cap­il­lar­ids, and As­carids, which are all in­testi­nal par­a­sites. Coc­cidio­sis is an­other par­a­site in chicks that in­fests the gut and vis­ceral parts of the bird such as the heart, liver, kid­neys, and lungs. (Ellis, et al., 1996)

• Ecosystem Impact
• disperses seeds

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Pos­i­tive

The human re­la­tion­ship with A. virgo varies. Africans will raise demoi­selle chicks as pets, these cranes are pop­u­lar in the zoos of Eu­rope and the Ori­ent, and they are also hunted or trapped dur­ing mi­gra­tion for food, or for pets. The eco­nomic im­por­tance of demoi­selle cranes is lim­ited mostly to the food and pet trade. (Ellis, et al., 1996; Johns­gard, 1983; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

• Positive Impacts
• pet trade
• food
• research and education

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Neg­a­tive

The only known ad­verse af­fect of A. virgo is that they will use cul­ti­vated lands be­cause of the grow­ing pres­sures on their nat­ural habi­tat. Some­times these cranes will cause con­flict with farm­ers. Since the breed­ing grounds in the Eurasian Steppes are ex­tremely ap­peal­ing for agri­cul­tural de­vel­op­ment, demoi­selle cranes have learned to suc­cess­fully re­pro­duce in agri­cul­tural fields. How­ever, these birds can cause sig­nif­i­cant crop dam­age, in­flict­ing se­ri­ous dam­age to ripened mil­let and other crops in re­sult of hav­ing to live in these fields. Two of the lead­ing con­tro­ver­sies that af­fect the pop­u­la­tion of this species are the poi­son­ing and shoot­ing of these birds, mainly by the ad­versely af­fected farm­ers. (Ellis, et al., 1996; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

• Negative Impacts
• crop pest

Con­ser­va­tion Sta­tus

There are a va­ri­ety of threats that af­fect the pop­u­la­tion of A. virgo, in­clud­ing:

Habi­tat Loss and Degra­da­tion:

• Con­ver­sion of grass­lands
• Changes in agri­cul­tural land use
• Dams and water di­ver­sion
• Urban ex­pan­sion and land de­vel­op­ment
• Af­foresta­tion
• Changes in veg­e­ta­tion
• Pol­lu­tion and En­vi­ron­men­tal con­t­a­m­i­na­tion
• Oil de­vel­op­ment
• Col­li­sion with util­ity lines

Di­rect Ex­ploita­tion:

• Over­hunt­ing
• Poach­ing
• Live trap­ping for do­mes­ti­ca­tion and com­mer­cial trade
• Poi­son­ing

The fu­ture of demoi­selle cranes is more sta­ble and se­cure than other cranes species. Mea­sures are being taken how­ever to di­min­ish the threats listed above. Con­ser­va­tion mea­sures that have been suc­cess­ful thus far in ben­e­fit­ing A. virgo in­clude in­creased:

• Pro­tec­tion
• Es­tab­lish­ment of pro­tected areas
• Local sur­veys and stud­ies of mi­gra­tion routes
• De­vel­op­ment of mon­i­tor­ing pro­grams
• Avail­abil­ity of In­for­ma­tion ex­change

The de­vel­op­ment of a pub­lic ed­u­ca­tion pro­grams in the breed­ing and mi­gra­tion ranges of demoi­selle cranes, and the de­vel­op­ment of more spe­cial­ized ed­u­ca­tion pro­grams in­volv­ing hunters in Afghanistan and Pak­istan are cur­rently un­der­way. These pro­grams will as­sure more pub­lic aware­ness of this species, and will hope­fully and even­tu­ally de­rive more sup­port in the con­ser­va­tion of A. virgo.

The Cranes: Sta­tus Sur­vey and Con­ser­va­tion Ac­tion Plan has looked at the con­ser­va­tion sta­tus of in­di­vid­u­als in the six re­gional pop­u­la­tions where demoi­selle cranes are lo­cated. Their es­ti­mate is as fol­lows:

• The Atlas pop­u­la­tion:

  Crit­i­cally en­dan­gered

• The Black Sea pop­u­la­tion:

  En­dan­gered

• The Turkey pop­u­la­tion:

  Crit­i­cally en­dan­gered

• The Kalmykia pop­u­la­tion:

  Lower Risk

• The Kaza­khstan/Cen­tral Asia pop­u­la­tion:

  Lower Risk

• The East­ern Asia pop­u­la­tion:

  Vul­ner­a­ble

(Ellis, et al., 1996; "The Demoi­selle", 1999; Johns­gard, 1983; Meine and Archibald, 1996)

• IUCN Red List

  Least Concern
  More information

• IUCN Red List

  Least Concern
  More information

• CITES

  Appendix II

Other Com­ments

Cranes in gen­eral have al­ways in­spired ex­pres­sion through art, mythol­ogy, leg­end, and ar­ti­facts - con­tin­u­ally evok­ing strong emo­tional re­sponses. They have also had a pre­dom­i­nant place in re­li­gion, and have ap­peared in pic­tographs, pet­ro­glyphs, and ce­ram­ics. In an­cient Egyp­tion tombs, demoi­selle cranes have a strong ap­pear­ance in the an­cient art.

Cranes as a whole have var­i­ous sig­nif­i­cance in var­i­ous cul­tures, in­clud­ing: watch­ful­ness, steadi­ness, mu­tual aid, longevity, hap­pi­ness, ma­ter­nal bliss, and good luck. (Meine and Archibald, 1996)

Con­trib­u­tors

Matthew Wund (ed­i­tor), Uni­ver­sity of Michi­gan-Ann Arbor.

Megan Mer­taugh (au­thor), Uni­ver­sity of Michi­gan-Ann Arbor, Phil Myers (ed­i­tor), Mu­seum of Zo­ol­ogy, Uni­ver­sity of Michi­gan-Ann Arbor.

Ref­er­ences

2000. "Demoi­selle Crane" (On-line ). An­i­mal Fact Sheets. Ac­cessed 03/19/03 at http://​zoo.​org/​educate/​fact_​sheets/​dem_​crane/​dcrane.​htm.

In­ter­na­tional Crane Foun­da­tion. 1999. "The Demoi­selle" (On-line ). Crane Species. Ac­cessed 03/19/03 at http://​savingcranes.​org/​species/​demi.​asp.

Ellis, D., G. Gee, C. Mi­rande. 1996. Cranes: Their Bi­ol­ogy, Hus­bandry, and Con­ser­va­tion. Wash­ing­ton, DC: De­part­ment of the In­te­rior, Na­tional Bi­o­log­i­cal Ser­vice.

Johns­gard, P. 1983. Cranes of the World. Bloom­inton, IN: In­di­ana Uni­ver­sity Press.

Ly, L. "The Demoi­selle Crane" (On-line ). Who­Zoo. Ac­cessed 03/19/03 at http://​whozoo.​org/​Intro98/​lely/​lelypage2.​html.

Meine, C., G. Archibald. 1996. The Cranes. Gland, Switzer­land: In­ter­na­tional Union for Con­ser­va­tion of Na­ture and Nat­ural Re­sources.