I’d rather have a nocturnally corn fed mallard over a crane

Hit the nail on the head. Grain fed duck or Specklebelly goose is better than crane. The best I've had was peanut fed Specklebelly.

I like crane, but it is way overhyped and definitely nowhere close to a ribeye.

Very underrated reply here.

Off topic but my comments might lend some clarity. The majority of mallards and pintail that come down the central Flyway are born in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, or the Dakotas. As soon as the crops come off they transition to feeding daily in harvested grain fields. Peas, Barley, Wheat, Soy Beans, Corn (last crop to come off) and further south peanuts, in that order. The daily routine is roost on potholes and small protected water. Leave in the morning to feed in the fields. Loaf in the afternoon on small sloughs. Return to the fields to feed till sundown. Return to roost ponds. Field decoys on dry land in harvested grain fields is how they are predominately hunted. The locals frown on hunting the water and frequently will deny access if you hunt water. The birds have ample food supply in the Ag fields and are putting on fat to migrate. If they have unmolested water to rest on they will stick around till the freeze line pushes them south. Hunt the water and they move on. This pattern holds all the way to Kansas. A little to the west it holds to the Texas Panhandle. Those birds get on grain in September and stay on it till the freeze line pushes them south of big agriculture. Those birds have a higher fat content and are noticeably milder tasting than the mallards I shoot at the southern end of the Flyway. In my part of Texas the best eating waterfowl are wood ducks that are feeding on acorns in flooded timber.
The bulk of texas waterfowlers do not shoot grain fed ducks in Texas. Guy, I hunt up north a couple weeks every year. Yes the meat is not as strong smelling in the grain fed birds. It is the same principle as finishing a calf before butchering and upping the the grade to prime by what you feed it the last 30 days.

That's pretty impressive Smokey Bear, I'm buying it. Thanks. So a crane feeding on TX Panhandle or South Plains ag fields should be good to go?

BTW, you guys got me wanting to do a crane hunt, maybe we should do a THF guided hunt like old times.