drone-helps-conservation-group-threatened-sandhill-crane

Actually, it's tens of thousands of birds and a single drone, an unmanned flying
machine with a wingspan the size of an extra-large pizza. And on a recent
afternoon, while the birds land, flit and flutter in the plowed cornfields and
watering holes of the California Delta, it's not Superman we see but a drone
hovering 125 feet overhead, whirring like a weed-whacker, its attached camera
recording the avian lovefest down on the ground.

In a novel use of drone technology to further conservation efforts, researchers
from The Nature Conservancy have brought their $2,000 DJI Phantom quadcopter
into the heart of Staten Island, a working farm west of Lodi acquired by the
group in 2001 as both a living laboratory and a refuge for migratory birds.
Their mission: to use the drone-generated aerial photos and videos to get a more
accurate head-count of the threatened greater sandhill crane, the island's
largest and most majestic winter visitor.

Thanks to Ron Gleason