Northern Dancers: The Red-Crowned Cranes of Hokkaidō (Photos)

A white landscape with cranes as the temperature dips to –27°C (January).

Cranes singing together on a cold morning (January).

A family searches for food among the frost (January).

Soaring in the blue sky (January).

Wading in the waters of the vast Kushiro Wetland National Park (July).

A courtship dance among summer greenery (July).

On a hill above the wetland (July).

A mated pair in evening (September).

Yezo sika deer pass by a crane as they cross a wetland lake (October).

Foraging for food against a backdrop of autumn oak leaves (October).

A family flies through morning mist (October).

Cranes gathered together in morning (October).

The river does not freeze over even in the bitter cold of winter (January).

Returning to their wetland resting place at the end of the day (February).