# Sandhill Crane damage to planted corn



## webfarmer (Apr 5, 2005)

I have severe Sandhill Crane damage to my corn food plots here in Hillsdale. They will actually walk down the row and pull out every planted kernel. I just read Michigan approved the temporary use of "Avitec" - something you can apply to seed which tastes bad to birds. I plan to try it - just wanted to pass along the news. Good Luck!


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## wyle_e_coyote (Aug 13, 2004)

I'll try to shoot one in North Dakota this year, to even the score a little..


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## answerguy8 (Oct 15, 2001)

webfarmer said:


> I have severe Sandhill Crane damage to my corn food plots here in Hillsdale. They will actually walk down the row and pull out every planted kernel. I just read Michigan approved the temporary use of "Avitec" - something you can apply to seed which tastes bad to birds. I plan to try it - just wanted to pass along the news. Good Luck!


Have you planted your corn already? If so, wow!


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## johnhunter (Jun 17, 2000)

I understand they have a hunting season on sandhill cranes down in Texas, with liberal bag limits. Sandhill cranes are _very_ destructive to newly-sprouted corn. These birds may become the Canada Goose of the new millenium.


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## November Sunrise (Jan 12, 2006)

I hunt a number of farms in Calhoun County that are only a short distance from the Baker Sanctuary. The November population of sandhill cranes that stop in that area is unreal. 

There are times when individual fields will be holding 1,500-2,000 birds. No kidding. 

I've never seen anything like it anywhere else.


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## wild bill (Apr 20, 2001)

i had trouble with them last year picking the new corn sprouts out of the ground.most of the time a quick trip down the trails on the quad got rid of them for the day.


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## 22 Chuck (Feb 2, 2006)

I suspect in the pheasant haydays the pheasant also ate the soft corn seed-I know they did in the Toledo area.

Dad used to coat the seed with sone tarry substance perhaps creosote. A tablespoonful would coat over a gallon of seed. It acted as stated-gave the seed a bad taste. They would pull a couple and move on instead of moving down the row and getting most.


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## snaggs (Jul 20, 2005)

...........I've posted this before...here goes again....A Male Sandhill Crane broke out ( 7 ) seven of my patio screens seeing his reflection on the sliding glass door.......The same bird broke a very large pane of glass in my front window...again seeing his reflection in the window...all this because I feed deer corn for viewing which attracts the Cranes...but it also attracts Canada Geese. squirrels.crows woodchuck.mallards racoons..and a variety of other creatures....after chasing the Cranes away for two years they finally got the message and stay across the road feeding on grasshoppers and whatnot........destructive for sure....but a nice bird...


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## Hamilton Reef (Jan 20, 2000)

Cranes a pain for farmers

http://www.mlive.com/news/jacitpat/index.ssf?/base/news-17/114952351939220.xml&coll=3

Monday, June 05, 2006 By Steven Hepker [email protected] -- 768-4923 

Rich Parks' corn field looks lush from the road, the destruction and the guilty party hidden behind a ridge traversing the 40 acres.

"Watch the difference over the hill," Parks said last week as he crested the hill to a field nearly void of corn, plucked clean by pesky greater sandhill cranes. 

As if to taunt him, a flock of 15 trumpeting cranes lifted off the field and winged south, likely to the next corn field.

Cranes have eaten $1,500 worth of Pioneer seed corn from his field on Waterloo-Munith Road, and at least that much in another of his fields on Mount Hope Road. 

Even after replanting and perfect weather, he expects to lose 20 percent of his corn crop, he said. 

Parks and neighboring farmer Robert Hannewald invited state wildlife biologist Eric Dunton to survey the damage and offer some options. They came away frustrated. 

"People with gardens can shoot 'possums and raccoons and rabbits, but I'm not allowed to protect my crop?" Parks declared. 

Dunton said cranes are protected in Michigan by the federal Migratory Bird Treaty, and the Department of Natural Resources cannot offer kill permits. Although cranes are hunted in states such as Texas, it is a federal violation to kill them in Michigan. 

"We can offer some harassment techniques, some shell crackers," Dunton said. 

Shell crackers are shotgun shells that explode in the air. Parks and Hannewald said shotguns no longer scare the birds.

Only the U.S. Fish &amp; Wildlife Service and U.S. Department of Agriculture can issue crop-damage permits for cranes. The cost is $100, it takes four to six weeks, and the maximum kill is five birds on one permit. 

"Five out of 500," Hannewald said. 

Crane damage to crops is not new. It's just getting worse as the flocks expand in southern Michigan. The leggy gray birds tend to congregate on a few farms and cause extensive damage not evident to motorists.

"My dad fought cranes all his life," Parks, a dairy farmer, said. 

Hannewald, whose family also pioneered Waterloo Township, remembers when crane sightings were rare. 

"When I was a kid it was such an event seeing a crane," he said. "Everybody came running." 

Ronald Hoffman, a retired biology teacher, said volunteers counted 15,191 cranes in Michigan last fall. In 1931, only 17 pairs of cranes remained in southern Michigan. 

Parks said cranes take a bigger bite out of farm income than weather or deer. Wildlife damage is not covered by crop insurance. 

Cranes walk down a row of corn, uprooting young stalks and eating the kernel. More recently, they have learned to harvest the freshly planted seeds. 

"They poke in the soil until they find a seed, then go right down the row once they learn how the field is planted," said Dunton, acting wildlife biologist at the DNR's Waterloo office. 

There is hope in a new seed treatment, Avitec. The substance is applied in the corn planter. It tastes terrible and repels the birds without hurting them. 

"That would be a lot more effective than scaring birds from one field to the next," Hoffman said. 

Parks said such a treatment represents one more cost of doing business that farmers should not have to shoulder. 

The DNR is looking at experiments with Avitec in Great Lakes states. For now, it recommends farmers apply early in spring for damage control permits, then use a combination of harassment and killing a few to train birds to eat elsewhere.


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## multibeard (Mar 3, 2002)

The big dairy farm I hunted on the Garden Peninsula in the UP was plagued with cranes. Finally after compiling for ever a fed guy came out to look at the problem. He shot cracker shells over a corn field. Of course the birds all flew away. The fed stuck out his chest and proclaimed that they were not going to be a problem in the field.

Sid the farmer said big deal all you did was chase them to another one of my fields.


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## Hamilton Reef (Jan 20, 2000)

If I get to go to the MUCC convention this month I'll vote "Yes" on the resolution to make the sandhill crane a hunting opportunity in the future.


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## snaggs (Jul 20, 2005)

........One broken front window...$100.00..self installed...sandhill pecking at reflection in glass.....seven (7) broken patio screens ( door wall screens ) $55.00..self installed...same male sandhill crane pecking at reflection thru screen door wall only different day.....protected in Michigan however may soon find out how sandhills taste on the Bar-B..... All this 3 years ago...but chased the pair with youngsters away several days in a row ...they have learned to avoid my deer viewing corn now....


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## webfarmer (Apr 5, 2005)

Well, I ended up too busy trying Avitec on the corn - didn't get any in the ground this spring. Still busy getting fields planted in food plots - late, late, late. I saw that article in the Cit Pat today - about time people understood. I cannot imagine how real farmers cope with them except to shoot and take their chances. For whatever good reason on my place, only one bird hangs out here now - and no offspring. Maybe I chased them away enough but I highly doubt it. Good to see other sportsmen understanding and taking a stand. Thanks guys!!!!


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