Cranes?

It was nice this morning. It was already getting warm when we got up. I took my cup of coffee outside to enjoy the nice breeze. Forry soon joined me and we were just chatting and enjoying the morning when a large flock of birds flew over. My first thought was geese, but hey weren't honking and they were white with black trailing edges on their wings. There must have been over a hundred of them!

We quickly went for our binos, trying to identify them. They climbed high, then sort of swarmed around each other, making large circles high in the sky. Through the binos, we could clearly see the black wing edges and the long legs trailing behind them as they flew. We had never seen birds act in this manner. We got the bird books and decided they were definitely cranes, but what kind? There are large groups of Sandhill Cranes around here (Othello even has a Sandhill Crane Festival.), but these birds were bright white, not tan. Could they be Whooping Cranes? They sure looked like it, but they're not supposed to be in this part of the country...

We did a bit more work outside, putting stuff away from the car. I straightened out the metal peacock from MM which had gotten a bit bent down in Arizona and Forry found a spot for it on the edge of the patio. We looked for the hose nozzle we were sure was in one of the basement bays, but never did find it. I'm sure it will show up as soon as we buy a replacement...