Sandhill Cranes fly overhead at dusk near Kearney, Nebraska. Photo by Katherine Stahla Every year, more than six hundred thousand of North America’s strangest sounding birds make a pit stop on their annual flight north. Each spring marks the beginning of flyover season in Kearney, Nebraska, the self-declared Sandhill Crane Capital of the World. Kearney lies on the Platte River, which starts in the mountains of Colorado and Wyoming and flows through central Nebraska to join the Missouri river. Snowmelt west of Denver flows across Colorado’s eastern plains into the South Platte, while waters near Walden, Colorado and Casper, Wyoming make up the North Platte.