Photograph Nebraska will feature Crane Trust Wildlife tours.

Join us at the Hastings Photography Symposium this February. The Nature Center will be hosting photographic wildlife tours as an option during this event. Hope to see you there!

Getting Started by Looking Back.

Twenty-three years ago, a group of people got together to launch an idea. It came from a need for a place to connect people with the sandhill cranes. People were showing up in the area to see cranes in ever increasing numbers. People had written about the birds: Johnsgard, Lingle, and Archibald. When they wrote, the birders took note. Then the public took notice when people like Forsberg, Sartore, and Tebbel began to get it out there that this was something unique.

People that grew up around here knew about the cranes, they’re everywhere. Love them or hate them, they’re just part of being here as much as planting corn and the dicey weather each spring. For most, it never occurred that this was something unique or exotic. Who are these people and why are they coming to see these birds? But come they did, and the hospitality industry began to see an increase in an otherwise slow time of year.