Dogmom, I forgot to add that the Sandhill crane that was doing his mating dance last year did indeed find a mate. We were so hoping to see baby Sandhills this year, but so far we haven't, and I think we won't this year. They don't start having babies until they are at least 2 (which I think the male is, and probably the female, too), and up until about age 7. So they're still young yet. Sandhill Cranes don't "leave home" until they are close to a year which is probably about when we saw him last year, so that would make him about 2 now since it's been a whole year already. (Hence why we call him and her Niles and Daphne 
) We have 5 acres, all unfenced (and we don't plan to change that unless we have a reason to) so this wildlife is just roaming all over. We love this. We also have 3 ponds on our property - 1 large one, 1 medium one, and one small one. The large one is the only one we see all this activity on. We were thinking of maybe trying to expand the small one to see if that brings more critters. So far, no skunks here! BUT we think we have a badger across the wetlands. Those are NOT friendly.
