Xiang Yang carefully looked at the red-crowned cranes above his head, while distinguishing their calls.
The pitch and frequency of the red-crowned crane's calls vary greatly depending on sex, age, behavior, and environmental conditions.
Generally, the red-crowned cranes make calls in clusters or singly. They not only call when taking off and flying in the air, but also when feeding and roosting on the ground.
Its call can be heard almost every hour of every day throughout the year, but is most frequent around dawn.
Every day before dawn, as soon as one bird starts singing, a second bird will immediately respond, and then the group will respond to each other in a series of sounds, making endless noise until sunrise.
The calls of red-crowned cranes are not only a way of communicating and expressing affection between spouses and group members, but are also often used to express agitation and warning against danger, but more importantly, they serve as an accompaniment to the nuptial dance.
When the male bird in the breeding season sings with the female bird, it raises its head to the sky, vibrates its wings frequently, and emits a high-pitched and long single note in one beat. The female bird also raises her head to the sky, but does not flap her wings, and emits two or three short and sharp compound notes in one beat.
This duet is not only a declaration of love by the red-crowned cranes, but also a warning to would-be invaders. It also enables the male and female birds to synchronize their sexual behavior and ensure successful reproduction.
The chirping sounds of young birds are mainly for asking for food.
After leaving their parents, one-year-old chicks will defend their territory and sing aimlessly.
Red-crowned cranes over two years old will sing in unison and make calls before mating.
In addition, there are calls for takeoff and alarm, calls when nesting, etc.
"Fang Youqun." Xiang Yang suddenly shouted.
"What's wrong? Brother Yang." Fang Youqun asked immediately.
Xiang Yang smiled and asked, "Have you ever seen Crane Dance?"
"Crane Dance?" Fang Youqun wondered.
"If you haven't seen it, watch carefully. These red-crowned cranes should be able to dance soon." Xiang Yang said with a smile.
Soon after the red-crowned cranes arrive at their breeding grounds, they begin to pair up and occupy nesting areas. The male and female birds declare their possession of the territory to each other by constantly singing in the nesting area.
Courtship is also accompanied by singing, and the male bird often points its beak upwards, raises its head and neck, looks up to the sky, stands with its wings erect, and sings at the top of its voice, making a loud "huh, huh, huh" sound.
The females respond with loud calls, and then they sing, jump and dance to each other.
The red-crowned crane dances very gracefully, stretching its neck and raising its head, bending its knees and waist, stepping on the spot, jumping in the air, and sometimes picking up pebbles or twigs and throwing them into the air.
The dance of the red-crowned crane is mostly composed of continuous changes of dozens or hundreds of movements.
The main movements of the dance include stretching the waist and raising the head, bending, jumping, kicking, walking with wings spread, bending the back, bowing, holding objects, etc., but the postures, amplitudes, and speeds are different.
These movements and their subsequent movements are organically combined together, such as bending over—stretching the waist and raising the head—rapidly swinging the head up and down.
Spread your wings—stretch your back and raise your head—bend your waist.
Stretch your waist and raise your head—bend at the waist—jump with your feet pointing downwards.
Spread wings and bend over—bend over and walk—the neck and body form an eight-shaped shape with wings spread and something in hand—spread wings and walk.
Carrying a load—jumping parabola—body rotation without changing position.
The red-crowned crane can jump, bend over, etc. by relying on its leg strength or wing flapping.
Most of these actions of the red-crowned crane have relatively clear purposes. For example, bowing generally expresses friendship and love.
The whole body is tense and the head is bowed to show one's presence, to show off, or to intimidate.
Bending the waist and spreading the wings indicate contentment and leisure; spreading the wings sometimes indicates a happy mood.
"Watch carefully, the chances of encountering a red-crowned crane in the wild are rare." Xiang Yang said with a smile.
The current situation of the red-crowned crane population is very miserable.
The red-crowned crane requires a clean and open wetland environment as its habitat and is the most sensitive indicator organism to changes in the wetland environment.
Due to the continuous growth of human population, the habitat of red-crowned cranes has been continuously transformed into farmland or cities. For example, Yueliangpao in western Jilin was once a breeding ground for red-crowned cranes. However, due to artificial embankment construction, the water level inside the embankment rose, the emergent plant belt basically disappeared, the floodplain outside the embankment dried up and was reclaimed into farmland, and the red-crowned cranes have since become extinct.
For example, the swamp area between Shaobo Lake and Gaoyou Lake in my country was once the wintering ground for red-crowned cranes. However, due to the increasing number of people going to the area for fishing, grazing and hunting every year, increased human interference, as well as egg picking and poaching, the number of red-crowned cranes has decreased sharply.
The total number of red-crowned cranes in the world is estimated to be only about 2,000, of which about 1,000 overwinter in my country. Protecting red-crowned cranes and their living environment is of concern to more and more people.
my country has established more than 20 nature reserves mainly for the protection of red-crowned cranes. Among them, Xianghai, Dongting Lake, and Poyang Lake have been included in the international La Musar Treaty list of wetlands, which has made great progress in protection work.
As for the red-crowned cranes on the sea, except for a few hundred that stay in the Hokkaido fishing grounds for a long time to forage for food, it is very difficult to see them in other sea areas.
This time, Xiang Yang sailed near Naha. This group of red-crowned cranes were most likely the same group that had stayed in the Hokkaido fishing grounds for a long time.
In the history of our country, the red-crowned crane is recognized as a first-class artificial bird.
The Ming and Qing dynasties endowed the red-crowned crane with cultural connotations of loyalty, integrity, and noble character.
The official uniforms of civil officials of the first rank were embroidered with red-crowned cranes, which was regarded as an important symbol second only to the dragon and phoenix which were exclusively used by the royal family. Therefore, people also called the crane the first rank bird.
People also regard the crane as a symbol of high officialdom.
An auspicious picture of a crane standing on a rock at the tide, with the homophones of "chao" and "chao", symbolizing a high-ranking official like a prime minister.
The pattern of cranes flying in the clouds symbolizes "promotion to the first rank"; the pattern of cranes flying at sunrise symbolizes "promotion in the near future."
In fact, the legendary crane is also the red-crowned crane, a large wading bird that lives in swamps or shallow waters and is often dubbed the "God of Wetlands".
It has nothing to do with the pine trees that grow in the mountains and hills.
However, since the red-crowned crane can live up to fifty or sixty years, people often paint it together with pine trees as a symbol of longevity.
Residents of East Asia use the red-crowned crane to symbolize happiness, good luck, longevity and loyalty.
It has frequently appeared in the literature and art works of various countries. The image of the crane appeared in sculptures in the tombs of the Shang Dynasty.
Bronze bells and crane-shaped ritual vessels appeared during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period.
Xiang Yang was still admiring the group of red-crowned cranes. At this time, Chen Qingsheng's voice came from Xiang Yang's intercom again. Chen Qingsheng's voice was very helpless, "Boss, the sea fish in the fishing net are too tight. I'm afraid there is no way to put another rope in the fishing net. What should we do now? Should we just abandon the net?"