This week “Live from Lindsborg” takes us to a peaceful place that we encourage you to visit on your way to or from Lindsborg. And…bring your walking shoes or your bike! The road around this marsh is packed gravel and provide a great multi-mile ride.

Cheyenne Bottoms is the largest marsh in the interior of the United States and was designated a Wetland of International Importance in 1988 by the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, one of two sites in the state - the other being Quivira National Wildlife Refuge. The area is considered the most important shorebird migration point in the western hemisphere. Approximately 45 percent of the North American shorebird population stops at the Bottoms during spring migration.

At least 320 species of birds have been recorded at the Bottoms. The area is critical habitat for several threatened and endangered species, including the whooping crane, bald eagle, peregrine falcon, least tern, and piping plover. More than 25 species of ducks and geese have been identified at the Bottoms and at times have numbered in excess of 600,000 birds. In mid-March thousands of sandhill cranes stop on the way to their staging area along the Platte River in Nebraska. April brings tens of thousands of shorebirds to the mudflats where they probe the mud for bloodworms, the larval stage of a small fly known as the midge. During the summer, swarms of these insects are seen over the marshes. Common shorebirds include a variety of sandpipers, plovers, phalaropes, avocets, godwits, and dowitchers. Summer visitors often encounter huge flocks of red-winged and yellow-headed blackbirds. Herons are also common during the summer; great blue herons, snowy egrets, black-crowned night herons, and American bitterns search the shallows for fish and frogs. A highlight of fall migration is the impressive flocks of undulating, circling, white pelicans. At times, large "islands" of the birds are seen across the marsh.

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Originally published on September 17, 2021.
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Live from Lindsborg! is a series of organically filmed videos sharing little-known facts about a variety of interesting places, people, and products in and about Lindsborg, "Little Sweden, USA!"
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