"WHAT A HUGE BIRD, WOW"... SANDHILL CRANES SPOTTED IN TANTRAMAR MARSH..In NEW BRUNSWICK,NOVA SCOTIA...CANADA

By Chandrayee Roy Choudhury, Canada: Amateur wildlife photographer Nick Landry felt as if he was snapping photos in the Serengeti. In reality, he'd spent several hours quietly working his way through the yellowed grasses of the Tantramar Marsh, near the New Brunswick-Nova Scotia border. His efforts paid off and he was rewarded with several shots of a recent resident of the area: sandhill cranes.  At nearly 1.3 metres tall, sandhill cranes are contenders for the biggest bird in the province. Their slate-grey colouring looks blazing white against the dead marsh grasses of April. With their blood-red foreheads, they're surreal to encounter. They're almost like nothing you've seen before," said Nick Landry. "It almost felt like you were in Africa because they look ... almost like an ostrich." The cranes are a rare sight in New Brunswick, not because they're rare, but because they're not supposed to be here.