Tennessee had an Unusual Asian Visitor this Week
A rare Asian Hooded Crane – Spec. Name: Grus monacha, normally seen only in southeast Asia, China and Japan, apparently “took a wrong turn” and has joined sandhill cranes wintering at the Hiwassee Refuge in southeast Tennessee, bird experts say, drawing flocks of curious birdwatchers along with it.
Asian Hooded Crane - © Public Record
“It’s a great thrill,” said Melinda Welton, conservation chair for the Tennessee Ornithological Society and a bird migration researcher. “People are coming in from all over the country to see this bird.”
Ms Welton said local birdwatcher Charles Murray has been keeping a log of visitors to the town of Birchwood, near the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency refuge.
“He has had more than 700 people come and visit from all over the country to see this bird,” she said. “People have come from 26 states and from two countries, including Russia.”
The bird has been seen every day since mid-December, when the sandhill cranes arrived for their winter residency at the refuge.
Ms Welton said this particular type of crane “nests in southernRussia and northern China and winters in Japan.”
The TWRA said in a release that more than 8,000 of the hooded cranes – approximately 80 per cent of the world’s population of the species – winter on the Japanese island of Kyushu. It is unlikely that the bird escaped from captivity, Ms Welton said, since there are no bands or other markings. Instead she said it’s probably a happy freak occurrence that brought it to Tennessee.
“There have been other records of birds that take a wrong turn,” she said. “And now that he’s on the North Americancontinent, it looks like he’s associating with his closest relatives.”
In addition to the Asian crane and the flock of sandhills, whooping cranes are wintering at the refuge.
“This is the highlight of the century for southeast Tennessee,” said local birder Tommie Rogers.
“Likely there have never been three different crane species visible in the wild east of the Mississippi River before.”
Recopied from The Telegraph
H.J. Ruiz - Avian101 
Amazing! I hope he will be ok since he is so far from home.
Ditto! Thanks Karen!
Wow! My first thought would be that it had escaped from a zoo–but the article says they don’t think so. It’s interesting to think what route he would have taken to Tennessee.
Hi Kay,
That’s one question that is in everybody’s mind. That poor creature has been flying alone for thousands of miles! Thank you for your comment! 🙂