Storks

With the warm weather come the storks. I believe they are invited by the tourist bureau.

90% of the souvenirs of Alsace will have a stork on them. The bird is one of the symbols of Alsace and something in which the local folks take pride. At one point storks were nearly gone. Over the past 20 years there's been a concerted effort to re-establish the birds.

One of the measures called for fitting out chimneys with stork baskets, as shown above. I've been told that this is a tricky job because you often have to reinforce the chimney. Seems that stork nests can weigh upwards of 500 pounds where loaded with Mom, Dad, and Babies. (Baby storks....not baby humans awaiting delivery.)