GIBBON, Neb. (AP) - Audubon’s Rowe Sanctuary Director Bill Taddicken and his staff can’t wait to show crane migration season guests the view from four new discovery stations along the south side of the Platte River southwest of Gibbon.
“It will be a better panoramic view because you’re not looking out of little portholes,” Taddicken said about the new structures’ wide windows overlooking river sandbars that soon will be overnight roosting sites for hundreds of thousands of sandhill cranes for approximately six weeks.
The “little portholes” were small one-person windows at different heights in river-facing walls of the old viewing blinds.
“It (wider view) just increases the connection to the experience,” Taddicken told the Kearney Hub. “It’s more natural … more ergonomic. We’re trying to find that balance between the ultimate experience and protecting the cranes and the crane roosts from disturbance.”
Construction began last summer on the first discovery station east of the Iain Nicolson Audubon Center. The other three are west of the center.
“They’re going to be a much more world-class place to go to see cranes and they are also going to be able to be opened up and used year-round for education programs, for events, maybe weddings, things like that,” Taddicken said.
Contractor Cardinal Construction of Doniphan, co-owned by Mike Hollister and Chuck Koch, started construction on the east station July 15 and finished in mid-September. The work was slow and deliberate.
“They got through any problems or questions in that blind and then were able to go a lot faster on the other ones,” Taddicken said.
The three west buildings - two replacements and one new farther west site - were completed except for a few small details by late January.
Each discovery station cost approximately $125,000. Funds were provided by private donors and grants from public entities such as the Nebraska Environmental Trust and the Kearney Visitors Bureau.
Blind tour reservations opened Jan. 2 and many days and times filled quickly.
All weekends are popular, but they aren’t the only times when all four discovery stations will be full. For example, Taddicken said March 17 is fully booked “because it’s a day when a whole bunch of people want to come, and that’s in the middle of the week.”
He added that there still are some spaces available as the start of river blind tour season approaches, but openings “will be spotty.”
From March 6 through April 12, Rowe Sanctuary volunteers will take up to 30 people to each discovery station before sunrise to watch sandhill cranes wake up and prepare to fly to nearby cornfields and wet meadows for the day. Guides and other visitors will return to the blinds at dusk, when the big show is seeing cranes fly back to the river roosts.
Each tour group typically has two guides.
Taddicken said people who have been in Rowe Sanctuary blinds during past sandhill crane migration seasons will experience several new features in the discovery center design created with architect Lake Flato of Minnesota.
“There is more comfortable seating,” he said, “and you actually can see out (the windows) while seated if you are of normal height.”
There also is better space to store gear brought to the blind.
A big difference is a warming room in each discovery station where six to 10 people at a time can go to get away from open windows and wrap up in blankets for a while. Taddicken said they still will have a window that looks out on the river.
Windows stretching across the river side wall of the new blinds will be open throughout most morning and evening tours.
“If it’s snowing and the wind is blowing 40 miles per hour, some of them might be closed,” Taddicken said. “But 90 percent of the time, they will be open.”
Visitors still are asked to dress in dark-colored outerwear, and to turn off phones and adjust camera settings to avoid any bright light from screens or noise that might disturb the cranes.
Guides still will give instructions about when cameras use can start in the morning and must end in the evening, based on readings from light meters in the blinds.
Taddicken said it is important to remember that visitors will walk between the Nicolson Audubon Center and the discovery stations in the dark and on uneven ground, so sturdy footwear is important.
It will be cold weather for the walk to and time in the discovery stations, so wear appropriate warm clothing, he added.
Although it’s common to spend two to three hours in the blind during a tour, Taddicken said, “It depends on the experience and what’s going on (with the birds).”
Rowe Sanctuary also offers crane viewing opportunities inside the Nicolson Audubon Center for guests unable to take discovery station tours.
It was painfully clear a year ago that plans to give visitors the best opportunity to see one of the world’s last great wildlife migration events can be crushed by extreme weather events and impassable roads.
Many tours and other Rowe Sanctuary events were canceled last March because Elm Island Road, which runs along the south side of the Platte River and past the Nicolson Audubon Center, was a bog.
After the 2019 migration season, Taddicken estimated Rowe Sanctuary’s revenue losses at $250,000 - two-thirds of the typical income.
First, in early March, tours were canceled because the river remained frozen and sandhill cranes hadn’t arrived in significant numbers. Such circumstances have been seen in the past.
Then the March 13 bomb cyclone hit and the combination of ongoing rainy weather and the melting of underground frost created extremely muddy, impassable road conditions.
Last year’s never-seen-it-so-bad road problems weigh on Taddicken’s mind as he wonders what Elm Island Road will be like during the 2020 sandhill crane migration season.
“I’m worried,” he said, “and I may be for the next 20 years.”
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