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Six feet in height, the sarus crane is the tallest flying bird in the world and towers over the two-feet-tall purple moorhen in the mushy marshlands.
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A family of four in close proximity to each other. The adults keep the young ones safe by providing them with protective flanking.
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A rare congregation of 10 sarus cranes, usually noticed while roosting at dusk or while bonding in the non-breeding season.
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Sarus cranes pair for life, yet every year in the lush landscapes during the monsoon season, they display a dramatic hopping dance to strengthen their bond.
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It is vital that the egg and newborn chick are protected against the elements and feral dogs, so the male and female sarus crane take turns guarding the nest and chick.
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Thd Dhanauri wetlands in Gautam Buddha Nagar district, Uttar Pradesh. Sarus cranes prefer such vast freshwater swampland habitats with minimum disturbances where they can frolic in peace. (There is a sarus crane pair at the top right-hand corner of this panoramic photograph.)
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Being tall and with an average weight of 9 to 10 kg, the sarus crane sometimes needs to run with few long steps to before lift-off into the air.
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Wing-stretching is another ploy the sarus crane has adopted to communicate and also to exercise its outsized wings that can spread up to 8 feet (2.4 m).
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The sarus crane’s black-tipped primary feathers (at the edge of its massive wings) support the bird’s mid-air manoeuvres and help it during landing.
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A sarus crane pair welcomes its first chick, with another egg yet to hatch in the large ground nest that has been made on a grassy mound in the wetlands.
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While a sarus crane is busy in its ponderous way looking for titbits in the grass, a cow in proximity to it is equally busy munching grass.
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Village residents tending to their cattle usually ignore the wading sarus cranes as they go about their daily duties.
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