Sandhills

A Review

“Those of the Gray Wind: The Sandhill Cranes” by Paul A. Johnsgard.

This slim, 116-page book (with rather large print) is a series of four linked short stories rather than one short story so a combined review makes sense.

It’s worth noting that the author, Johnsgard, is an ornithologist and emeritus professor at the University of Nebraska and, according to a profile of him on the school’s website, is considered Nebraska’s crane expert. He’s written some 50 books on various species, and it appears most are of a more technical nature.

In “Those of the Gray Wind” he goes fiction all the way, writing in third-person omniscient but relying on his extensive knowledge of sandhills. So not only do you get interesting stories, you learn about sandhill cranes.

While Johnsgard is a naturalist and looks at the world through an objective lens, there is undeniably some anthropomorphism that’s going on in this book. As a reader, you can’t help but pull for the individual sandhill, or family of sandhills or flock he writes about in the four vignettes.

The vignettes are broken into Spring 1860, Summer 1900, Fall 1940 and Winter 1980. So what you get are views of sandhills at various points in the year as well as how their habitat has been altered by humans during those 120 years.

The only book I can think of about fictionalized birds that’s similar, though far more powerfully written, is Fred Bodsworth’s novel-length “Last of the Curlews.” Bodsworth was a serious amateur naturalist but obviously not at Johnsgard’s level. On the other hand, Bodsworth was a journalist, a professional writer, which might account for the power of his curlew book. Bodsworth’s book is generally considered a classic of nature writing. I would not put Johnsgard’s book quite at that level, though it’s up there and worth reading.