One of the world’s greatest migrations pauses every March in one humble place, central Nebraska’s flat landscape full of cornfields, located in the middle of the United States.
While people may fly over or drive through the area at high speeds on Interstate Highway 80, sandhill cranes stop to appreciate the adjacent wide, braided channels of the shallow Platte River to roost and feed.
On a morning in mid-March, a ritual unfolds. Dozens of tourists gather at 5:45 a.m. at Audubon’s Rowe Sanctuary here and walk arm-in-arm down a dark trail, carefully feeling their way with their feet. As the group gets closer to the riverside blind, they are hit with sound. It’s described as a loud, but somehow gentle croak, chortle or rattle.