Cranes are loving and devoted birds that live in pairs.
When one of them dies, the other member of the couple lives alone one more year.
Then flies in the highest sky and from they let themselves fall to the ground.
They dont open their wings, because the pain and the longing for the lost one is so intense that they can no longer live.
This story was told by Pavel, our boatman in the Danube Delta, 2023. He said that he respects the cranes a lot for their power of love and also for the power to control their instincts, since they do not open their wings to fly, but let themselves die.