Meet the Class of 2013 Whooping Cranes
Hatch-year 2013 of the Eastern Flock
Back to Meet the Cranes 2013

Personality and Training: How did she get the name Klinger? ICF staff used the theme of TV sitcoms or sitcom characters when they named the new chicks. (A change in the numbering system is under discussion.) Klinger is named after Corporal Maxwell Klinger of the old TV show M*A*S*H. Klinger loves hunting minnows.

Klinger and the other DAR chicks were costume reared and then transported to Horicon Wildlfe Refuge in early September. The chicks will now spend more time out of a pen and less time with the costume until they're released to mingle with other wild Whooping cranes and Sandhill cranes. If all goes as planned, the youngsters will follow the older cranes and thereby learn the flock's southward migration route.

The DAR chicks got their legbands and colors on Sept 27. They were released at Horicon NWR on Oct 24, 2013. But sad news came in early December: Klinger was found dead on Horicon NWR, where six of the DAR birds still remained through frigid weather before starting their first southward migration. Death likely occurred Nov. 28 or 29.