Love is in the air

By Jack Elliott
Contributor

In the spring it is not only the young man’s fancy that turns to love. The same holds true for our feathered friends. Many of the courtships are very open and readily viewed by any interested observer. Some of the more exotic and secretive courtships you might think are visible only through the lens of National Geographic in the jungles of Indonesia or some other distant land. Not so, we have some very brilliant display rituals right in our own backyards. One of them is the sharp-tailed grouse.
Sharp-tailed grouse are readily identified by their name-sake upright pointed tail feathers, and the cackling, chicken like vocalizations. They are readily distinguishable from true prairie chickens by the male’s bright yellow comb and brilliant purple throat sacks. Their spring courtship dances are spectacular. Recently, Scott Laudenslager, Acting Area Wildlife Manager for the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources in Baudette, MN, invited me to use a blind the DNR had set up on the edge of a ‘dancing ground’ or lek.
Sharp-tailed grouse (Tympanuchus phasianellus) are known locally variously as sharpies, prairie chickens, and partridge, ( there are no partridges native to North America and true prairie chickens are a considerably different species not found in this area) . The sharp-tailed grouse is one of our most widely distributed grouse species originally ranging from Alaska and the Arctic Ocean, west to Oregon and California, south to the Gulf of Mexico, and well east of the Mississippi. It has diminished in range and numbers with several of the sub-species now endangered or extinct. We have two sub-species in our area, the one predominant in the Dakotas and Manitoba, preferring the more open grasslands, and the more easterly sub- species preferring more forested and brushy habitat.
Laudenslager says they have identified about a dozen leks in the Baudette area and many have been in use for many decades. They tend to be small open knolls with medium height grass open to the surrounding countryside with some areas of medium height scattered brush in the general area, and a general absence of conifers, a lightly pastured field or hay, blue grass or timothy stubble would be a good example. The leks run in size from an acre up to two or three acres.
When I arrived at the Baudette site on the road about 300 meters from the hide, I could hear the males vocalizing, but as it was still quite dark could not see anything. Approaching the hide, I heard a flurry of wings as the birds scattered, but as Laudenslager had promised within minutes of entering the hide, the males were back in force within yards of the hide. There were three to four dozen males calling and strutting. Love was certainly in the air.
It took another full hour for enough light to get good quality pictures of the displaying birds. Over there vocalizing I kept hearing the sound of a 4-wheeler motor, suspecting any moment an intruder would be wheeling up scattering the birds, but realized this sound was the birds themselves. When displaying, the males stamp their feet up to 25 times per second generating this ‘Honda’ mutter.
The male display consists of fluffing out the erect tail feathers, spreading their wings, lowering their head, stamping puffing out and displaying their purple throat sacks, and ‘booming ‘and cackling. This may be all at once or in individual sessions, but the arrival of hens will certainly intensify the activity
Displaying is not constant. It seems to pretty much coincide with the arrival of the hens. In their absence the males tend to sit pretty much still, generally a pair facing each other waiting with occasional sparring, for the arrival of the fairer sex. When spontaneous dancing, vocalizing, and outright fighting suddenly erupts across the lek you can bet one or more hens has arrived and sure enough the chase will be on. The hens decide which males they will let mate with them and studies show that one or two dominant males do 90% of the breeding.
Other observations are males on the edge of the lek will flutter up in the air to make themselves more conspicuous hoping to attract hens. Smaller males are sometimes seen running into the center of the lek where the dominant males hold court. Rather than displaying, they pretend to be females and at first opportunity will attempt to mate with an unattended hen. This generally results in a first class fight, squabble and chase, but apparently the intruder occasionally gets lucky and passes on a few genes.
The action can carry on all morning and into the afternoon, with an occasional mass exodus as something- a hawk, an eagle, or their imagination, will have them all disappear in a whir of wings, but give it five minutes and they’ll all be back. And again in an unusual way. They don’t fly into the lek, rather they mostly come running in immerging from the longer grass and brush, in this case from one end of the lek and spread out over its surface jousting for position. In the dim light it looked for all the world like a bunch of rabbits or woodchucks scurrying around at top speed. Then the strutting, stamping, and booming begin all over until the next emergency exit.
Activity on the leks begins in early April and can carry on well into May. Each lek will draw birds from a mile or two radius and as long as the surrounding habitat is correct may be used for many decades. The MNR blind in Baudette hold two- three observers in a pinch- and may be booked for use by calling Scott Laudenslager at the DNR at 218-634-1705. Or look around your area. Perhaps there is an active lek nearby you can set a blind up by.
So you don’t have to go to Indonesia. One of nature’s most impressive courtship displays is right in our own back yard