Understanding a Crane
Peter Matthiessen
These elegant birds, in their stature, grace, and beauty, their wild fierce temperament, are striking metaphors for the vanishing wilderness of our once bountiful earth; in addition, they function as “umbrella species” whose protection in the wild also protects a broad range of fauna and flora as well as the clean water, earth and air of their extensive territories — in short, sustains the astonishing variety of forms in nature (with their habitats and ecosystems) known as biodiversity. Since most crane species are cosmopolitan in range, they offer an opportunity to protest the stunted industrial (hence political) vision behind the broad range of unrestrained, often senseless activities, from war to the ill-advised building of great dams, that degrade or destroy what is left of precious habitats around the world — precious not only to cranes and other wildlife but to our inheritors and to their children.
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