Izumi Crane Observation Center

Yesterday we drove 4 hours north and east to the Izumi Crane Observation Center in the Kagoshima Prefecture.

This differs from the crane center in Wisconsin. These cranes (and crows) are not caged. They come here willingly. The center is adjacent to the sea. Some cranes winter here from Siberia. This is migration season.

There can be as many as 10,000 cranes in these rice fields.

Here are hooded cranes, white necked cranes, sandhill cranes, Siberian cranes and Demoiselle cranes.

So many cranes eating rice.

Burlap sacks of rice are ripped open and dumped on the roads between the rice fields.