Dancing with Grouse

Mating, sharp-tailed grouse style

By Mike Sturk

At 4:45 on a cool April morning, I entered the camouflaged tent-like blind that I'd set up the night before on a grass-blanketed pasture in the foothills of southwestern Alberta.

Five minutes later, the first sharp-tailed grouse flew in, then another and another until I lost count. Moments later, I was surrounded by sharp-tails clucking, chirping, cooing and making a clicking sound like many decks of playing cards being riffle-shuffled at the same time.

The sun wasn't even close to rising yet, but the grouse were already dancing up a storm in an intense spring mating ritual on their lek, a mating area named after the Swedish word for play.

To make sure I didn't miss the action, I'd tucked myself into a sleeping bag in my vehicle the night before and spent a few mainly sleepless hours listening to a spring chorus of frogs and waiting for the alarm to ring at 4:30.

As it turned out, the lack of sleep was worth it.

What I witnessed that morning lasted for three or four hours and was repeated every morning for about six weeks. Mottled brown and white male grouse with yellow eye combs and purple air sacs on their necks madly courted the drabber females with an enthusiasm seldom seen outside closing time at the local bar.

A friend had told me about the lek. I felt lucky because, although sharp-tails are found throughout Western Canada, the locations of leks are often not known or are closely-guarded secrets. When I called, the landowner graciously invited me out. But, he advised, make sure you set up your blind the night before and be in it before the grouse start arriving, generally 45 minutes before sunrise.

Sitting in the dark, listening to the grouse milling about the blind, I felt like a kid waiting to open presents at Christmas. The grouse were all around me but it wasn't light enough for photography until about 6 o'clock.

Once, when it was still too dark to take pictures, I heard the birds suddenly fly away. Hearing the flapping of a single bird, I strained to see the outline of a great-horned owl sitting on a grouse it had just caught for breakfast. When the owl flew off, the rest of the grouse returned and resumed dancing.

As the sun's first light started painting the pasture in pink and reddish hues, the curtain rose to a spectacular opening act. It was finally time to shoot photographs.

With the females lying flat or standing nonchalantly in the brown grass, dozens of eager males dropped their wings at their sides, pointed their short tail feathers skyward and strutted or furiously stamped their feathered feet on the ground while making a cacophony of strange sounds. It was easy to see that First Nations people fashioned the chicken dance they perform at pow-wows after mating sharp-tails.

Every now and then, two males would scrap, suddenly coming together in a violent flurry of biting beaks, bumping inflated breasts and punching feet armed with sharp toes. Then, just as quickly, they would retreat, and start the dance all over again.

I sat perched on a folding chair in the blind, taking image after spectacular image of an annual phenomenon few people ever get to see.