Virus outbreak cancels whooping crane count in Texas

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The coronavirus pandemic has canceled this year’s flights to count the only natural flock of whooping cranes — the first time in 71 years that crews in Texas couldn't make an aerial survey of the world’s rarest cranes.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has records of such surveys for every year starting in 1950, Wade Harrell, whooping crane recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said in an email Wednesday.

The flock breeds in Canada and winters on and around Aransas National Wildlife Refuge in Texas, where the survey is made.

Current protocols call for about six flights, each with a pilot and at least two observers — all of whom often come from different parts of the country — in the close quarters of a small plane, Harrell said.

"We decided to forgo the aerial survey this winter with COVID-19 cases currently spiking," he said in a news release last week.

At 5 feet (1.5 meters) high from their black feet to the little red caps on their heads, whooping cranes are the tallest birds in North America. They’re white with black wingtips, and their wingspan, at more than 7 feet (2.1 meters), is wider than a full-sized pickup truck. They mate for life.

Only about 825 exist — most of them in the natural flock, which is also the only one that doesn’t need human help to keep its numbers up. Habitat loss and hunting had cut that flock to 15 in 1941.

It's disappointing not to have the survey because people look forward to learning about each year's population increase, Liz Smith, national program director for the International Crane Foundation, said in a phone interview Wednesday. The pandemic also kept Wood Buffalo National Park in Canada from making its usual count.

The Fish and Wildlife Service and state and...