See MANY other clips here!

This photo provides an excellent view of the chick-rearing setup at the USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research center. In the foreground is 6-day old chick #401 eating crane-crumbles. The puppet head, suspended over the feeding dish, is to encourage HIM (confirmed - it's a boy!) to eat. In the coming days, a similar puppet head will be used to encourage him to follow the ultralight aircraft as it taxis slowly around a circular-enclosure (video clip). The heat lamp provides warmth for the tiny chick. The adult role model in the adjacent run is crane #6 from the 2002 hatch year. #206 was held back at the captive-breeding facility due to a very early wing injury, which would have limited its ability for flight. Since 206 had already undergone some early aircraft conditioning, this crane is now being used as a role model (video clip) for new WCEP chicks to ensure correct sexual imprinting occurs. Also in this photo, you can see the head of the plastic crane decoy. These are suspended in each of the chick pens so that the young cranes become familiar with it. Once the chicks are transported to Necedah NWR in Wisconsin in late June, these decoys also make the trip, and will be placed inside the roosting areas of each of the three training sites, which will make the transition to the new area a bit less stressful. 

Deviated or crooked toes are frequently encountered with hand-reared chicks at any age prior to fledging. Hand-reared chicks under 10 days of age frequently have one or two bent digits.  To detect the problem, the crane crew at Patuxent must observe the gait of each chick daily; *the middle toe should point straight forward with the other toes pointing approximately 45 degrees to each side. 

Toe misalignment can be corrected with a splint; sometimes only 1-2 days of support may be adequate. Splints made of small wooden dowels or popsicle sticks are taped to the crooked toe using low-tack tape such as the filament packing tape used above.