Now’s the time to spot the Delta’s iconic sandhill crane

In the fall, if you look to the skies, you might spot a sandhill crane. The iconic bird makes its way to the California Delta region each winter as part of its annual migration, generally arriving in October and sticking around until February. 

CapRadio’s Manola Secaira spoke with Stephanie Yee-Kay Chan and Courtney Matzke, the co-leads of the Sacramento birding group Bird Cult Sac. The two started the group as a way to meet other birding enthusiasts and post about events they’re hosting regularly on the group’s Instagram page. 

This month, Bird Cult set out with a group of their loyal followers (a.k.a. local birders) to look out for sandhill cranes at the Woodbridge Ecological Reserve near Lodi. It’s a place known to be a good area to spot the bird out and about. 

The birders camped out for a couple hours at a parking lot on the reserve with binoculars for this event, spotting a few sandhill cranes wading into the wetland’s waters and flying overhead.   

CapRadio spoke with Chan and Matzke about the sandhill crane — which also happens to be the bird featured in Bird Cult Sac’s logo — and the part birding plays in getting more connected to your local environment.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Interview Highlights

What got you into birding? 

CHAN: I started birding during the pandemic like a lot of other people. I was seeking places where I could take off my mask and walk my dog in open space. And at the time, I was living a few blocks away from Prospect Park in Brooklyn.

One day, I went out and someone pointed out to me a European goldfinch, which is a very small bird introduced to New York City in the late 1800s. It caught my eye, and I just thought to myself, "This is such a beautiful creature. How many other things have I not seen on Earth that are this beautiful?"

I think a lot of people would call it their ‘spark bird,’ which is the bird that sparks your inspiration to continue the hobby. 

MATZKE: I started birding about eight years ago, and I was a backyard birder. I put up some bird feeders and just started becoming fascinated with all the different birds that were coming through, and then of course wanted to know the names of every single bird. 

I just got to kind of watch them up close and personal and became obsessed. It's a fun hobby to get you outside and go hiking. And while you're doing that, you can make a bird list and kind of keep track of what you see. In that way, it's like a fun game and a hobby all together, and then eventually you start learning more about bird behavior in addition to just learning how to identify birds.

And I think something that's really cool about getting into that, getting into birds, is that a lot of times, I see people then learning more about the habitats and learning more about conservation and how to be a good steward for the land and for all the critters and plants that live here. 

Where did the idea for Bird Cult Sac come from? 

MATZKE: I'm relatively new to the area — I've been here for about a year and a half — and when I moved here, I didn't know a single person and I loved birding. So, my first thought was, "I want to get out and go hiking and explore and see if I can find any life or birds or just get to know the area." So, I started making some friends and trying to convince every friend that I met to come birding with me.

And surprisingly, people were into it. I wasn't sure if people would be, you know, because people are sometimes like, "What is that? That sounds boring.” But usually, once people do it, they end up loving it. So, I got a group of friends together, including Yee-Kay, and we went birding at Consumnus River Preserve.

CHAN: We had six people and we went to Cosumnes River, and I made a joke that we kind of looked like a cult walking around in the morning time. Then it just stuck. 

Stephanie Yee-Kay Chan is a co-lead of the Sacramento birding group Bird Cult Sac. Here, she speaks to members of the group at the Woodbridge Ecological Preserve near Lodi about sandhill cranes on Nov. 8, 2025.Manola Secaira/CapRadio

Why is now a good time of year to go see sandhill cranes?

CHAN: In the United States, there are five different flyways of sandhill crane migration. The largest is a central flyaway which receives about 80% of the cranes that migrate. We only really really receive around 5 to 10% in the Pacific flyway. They come down from Alaska in the fall and it takes them about a month to make that trip. It's about a 2,200-mi trip. And they end up here, in the Sacramento Delta, because there's a lot of agricultural land. 

Sandhill cranes have adapted to the human environment in a way that now 90% of their diet is mostly grains. So, mostly corn, wheat, rice. And as a kind of bread basket of California, the Sacramento Delta region has a lot of farmland, and they have taken advantage of that to settle here.

Is there anything about the sandhill crane that you find particularly interesting? 

MATZKE: I have an affinity for them because I'm from Florida, and in Florida, there are populations that stay there year round [because] they're non-migratory. I grew up seeing them in my front yard or at the golf course as I was just driving by. 

And when you see them that close, they're just really, really amazing and kind of prehistoric-looking — the closest thing to a dinosaur that you could see.

CHAN: I love that they are a prehistoric bird species. The earliest sandhill crane fossil was found in Florida and was estimated to be 2.5 million years old. And for me, it's so wonderful to see a live dinosaur in Sacramento, especially so many of them. 

Migration is a learned habit. It's not innate to a bird. And so thinking about the generations of sandhill cranes that have taught one another to come to the Sacramento Delta is very special. 

A group of sandhill cranes that recently migrated from Alaska to the Delta region, pictured at the Woodbridge Ecological Reserve near Lodi on Nov. 8, 2025.Courtesy of Livia Keene

Where should someone from Sacramento expect to find them in our region? 

CHAN: I would say wetlands. They love sleeping in the wetlands and then flying out during the sunrise and coming back in the sunset after feeding. In [Sacramento-region] places specifically, there's the Cosumnes River Preserve. There's also the Woodbridge Ecological Area … and then also you can go to the Yolo County Bypass Area. 

My particular favorite time to look for sandhill cranes is during sunset. You have a really beautiful orange sky setting over the wetlands and then you can see a mass of them just fly in all at once and hear their calls. 

What brings you back to birding? I’m curious about why this is the way you like to feel connected to your environment. 

CHAN: I think there's a very communal aspect of it, in that when you see something, you can point it out and teach about it and also learn about it. It also doubles as a very solitary activity that you can do on your own, anywhere.

And a big part of why we started Bird Cult was because there's this thought that birding is only accessible if you have car access or if you have the money to spend on expensive camera equipment or binoculars. But we try to limit those hardships for people. We try to provide carpools when we can, trying to just get more people out.  We're really trying to lower those barriers for people to enjoy the hobby.

MATZKE: We're also really open to anyone. We try to make it as accessible as possible. So, new birders, people who have never birded before, experts, ornithologists, people who just want to come to hang out — we're open to all of that and we encourage all kinds of folks to come join us.