On the evening of May 13 my 12-year-old son Gregory Clark spotted this “huge orange stork-like bird” as we drove past a farm on Middle Road in Chilmark.

Sandhill crane, a thrill to see on the Vineyard. — Maureen Williams Clark

We turned the car around and were able to sit and watch this amazing creature as it foraged in the meadow grasses.

Upon arriving home we tried to look it up online but were not having success. Then my mother Joan Williams, who is 87 years old and has seen just about everything in this world, and knows nature best of all, called out, “sandhill crane!” It just came to her as a possibility. Sure enough — that’s the fellow!

But a sandhill crane shouldn’t be on Martha’s Vineyard, or anywhere near the East Coast of New England, it should be in Nebraska, en route to nest in Alaska, from wintering over in Florida — strange. We hoped to see it again, but thought that this was a just resting stop, and that come nightfall it would resume its migration, headed north and west to Alaska.

Then yesterday, while gardening at the western tip of Squibnocket Farm, I heard what I had learned just the night before to be the trilling, piping call of the sandhill crane. I looked up and there he or she was, way, way up in the sky, huge wings slowly gracefully flapping, neck pulled in, long, powerful legs straight out behind. What a thrill!

I followed it in my sights, even snapped a distant photo, before it was out of sight. It looked to be returning to the meadow where we had seen it the day before. I got into my truck and headed over there. Sure enough, far in the distance I spotted the sandhill, moseying along through the grasses, picking at this and that.

What a wonderful majestic bird. We know it doesn’t belong here, but we hope it will stay a bit, and then go to where its own kind are to start a family.