The whooping crane came close to being a museum artifact. Instead, thanks to science-driven conservation endeavors, the courtly crane has seen an uptick in numbers that pleases those involved. Read more about the crane and its marvelous recovery.
Endangered Species:
One of the nation's most iconic endangered species, the whooping crane (Grus americana), faced a pivotal time in the mid- to late-1960s. Only 50 of the famed birds existed then—43 wintered at the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) and seven were held in captivity.
It's understandable that these majestic birds would be one of the first species to gain federal protection in 1967 under the Endangered Species Preservation Act, a precursor to today's Endangered Species Act. That same year, Aransas NWR celebrated its 30th anniversary. It was established in 1937 by Franklin D. Roosevelt to benefit waterfowl migrating along the Central Flyway, although whooping cranes had been previously known to spend winters there for generations.
Congress recognized the dire situation. In 1966, legislators allocated $350,000 to establish special research projects at Patuxent Wildlife Research Center (WRC) in Maryland aimed at lifting some of the nation's most imperiled animals from the brink of extinction. For the whooping crane, it would be a captive breeding program that would begin the species' long journey toward recovery.
On May 23, 1967, Ray Erickson from Patuxent WRC and Ernie Kuyt from the Canadian Wildlife Service (CWS) collected three eggs from whooping crane nests at Canada's Wood Buffalo National Park and delivered them to Patuxent WRC to start the captive breeding flock. This was a landmark
