How the capercaillie sounds. Grouse family (tetraonidae)
The capercaillie is one of the largest birds in Eurasia. Belongs to the subfamily of grouse. It is distinguished by a rounded tail and protruding, elongated feathers on the front of the neck. Of interest is the description with photos, pictures and videos, where you can not only read about the capercaillie, but also personally observe the behavior of this bird.
The body length of male capercaillie reaches 1.1 m, and the weight can be up to 6.5 kg. Females are much smaller (about a third) and weigh up to 2 kg.
Photo: large capercaillie and two females.
The habitat of the capercaillie is coniferous forests, less often mixed. The capercaillie bird is practically not found in the deciduous forest.
Interesting facts about capercaillie
Everyone is wondering why the capercaillie got such a name. There is a simple explanation for this. During the mating season, males become weakly susceptible to danger, lose sensitivity. That is, they are practically “stunned” by a surge of hormones.
In the photo above - current capercaillie.
Mating time for capercaillie comes in the spring. Capercaillie are polygamous. To choose a partner, they gather every year in the same parts of the forest (they are called tokovischa). These birds tokay (make special sounds) and perform a “marriage dance” on trees or on the ground.
The talk begins from the very early morning. It first consists of clicking, then turns into hissing and crackling.
The infrared component of the mating song of capercaillie, inaudible to the human ear, extends to a distance of up to 1 km, and audible to humans sound waves have a range of approximately 500 m.
The number of eggs in the laying of a capercaillie bird is 6-8 pieces. The females are the only ones who incubate the eggs and take care of the chicks.
Funny video: Brave capercaillie 2 (Wild cock 2). Watch the seventh minute!!!
Video: Capercaillie Tournament (Tetrao urogallus L.)
The capercaillie, or the deaf black grouse, is a large representative of the chicken order. This is a real forest bird - the taiga forests are the habitat of the capercaillie. It is known mainly as a hunting bird. years. Capercaillie lek on the ground and on trees, while the males make special sounds, take various poses, and sometimes fight violently. Even the legend is folded (hence the name of the bird) that the capercaillie during mating is so carried away by its singing that it doesn’t hear anything, and at this time you can just take it with your hands, and it doesn’t cost anything to shoot. Capercaillie really "sings" very enthusiastically. But he does not deaf while singing. He stops hearing only during the last bars, 4-8 seconds before the end of the song. Why this happens is still not clear. In general, the wood grouse is a very cautious bird, it lives, as a rule, in dense forests, keeps in bushes or in dense crowns of trees. It looks for food on the ground and on trees, and only during the nesting period does it completely move to live on the ground, but this applies only to the capercaillie, because. only she incubates the eggs and leads the chicks. Therefore, the females have a protective coloration.
The male reaches a length of 1 m and weighs 5-6 kg. It differs from the female in its brighter plumage. In addition, the female is much smaller and weighs only 1.5-3 kg. Bird nests are arranged right under the trees, near forest paths, usually a small hole in the ground. The female lays 5 to 12 eggs there. Chicks appear in a month. The mother will raise the offspring and take care of him until the chicks grow up. The chicks become mobile as soon as they dry out. The first days still need the help of the mother (they get cold at night), but by ten days of life they already fly well, and at the end of summer they become completely independent. At this time, the birds begin to stray into small flocks. But unlike black grouse, which have both females and males in flocks, capercaillie are strictly divided into “male” and “female” companies. The females stay with their mother, and the males leave with other males and return only a year later during the mating season to the lek. At this time, males show their beauty to females.
Capercaillie feed mainly on plant foods: in summer - berries, flowers, buds and leaves, in winter - needles. The chicks feed on insects and spiders. They often eat coarse, poorly digestible food (needles, end branches of trees) and in the stomachs of capercaillie there are especially a lot of pebbles - “millstones” that help grind food. They grind, grind even the shells of pine nuts, which these birds feed on in Siberia in winter.
Capercaillie are now becoming generally rare birds. Adults are killed by poachers and hunters, their numbers are declining due to the destruction of forests suitable for their life. The female and her brood are constantly under threat in her nest, since it is located on the ground. But a caring mother will never leave the nest if the chicks are in danger. thicket. Young growth dies from unexpected frosts, various predators destroy capercaillie. Only 20 percent of those that appeared in spring survive until autumn.
Grouse birds live in conditions of snowy winters, to which they are perfectly adapted. Their paws are feathered to the very fingers, and they can walk on a snow-covered crust without falling through. Many of them spend the night in the winter, buried in the snow. Capercaillie are strongly attached to their habitat and leave it only if it gets too cold.
Capercaillie is a real forest bird. It inhabits large tracts of large and old forests. various types, preferring, however, pine forests and oak forests. Most of his life leads a terrestrial-arboreal way of life, as he feeds on trees. An unforgettable spectacle - capercaillie current. In the evening, birds fly to the lek and spend the night there on a tree. At dawn, wood grouse start their current song, which lasts 5-6 seconds. This song is relatively quiet for such large bird, it is barely audible at a distance of more than 150 m and consists of two parts - "tekanya" and "turning". The capercaillie begins singing with a double click: "te-ke ... te-ke ... te-ke ..." hissing sounds, as if someone is cleaning a pan with a metal brush. During this "turning" (sounds similar to those heard when sharpening a scythe), the capercaillie loses his hearing, hence the well-known comparison: "Deaf, like a capercaillie on a current."
Like all grouse, only hens hatch chicks. The chicks leave the nest shortly after hatching from the egg. Due to their coloring, they are almost invisible against the background of forest vegetation.
Capercaillie (Tetrao urogallus)
| Value | Male body length up to 90 cm, weight from 3.5 to 6.5 kg; the female has a length of 60 cm, weight from 1.7 to 2.3 kg |
| signs | Male: grayish-gray plumage, black goiter with a green metallic sheen, brown wings, black tail with white spots, black beard and white beak; female: yellowish-red striped, with brown and buffy tops of feathers, rather long, rounded tail |
| Nutrition | Plant shoots, needles (especially pine needles), berries, insects (ants) |
| reproduction | At the foot of a tree or between low bushes; 7-11 yellow-brown eggs, starting from April; incubation lasts 27 days; one brood per year |
| habitats | Quiet coniferous and mixed forests with dense undergrowth of berry bushes; lives all year round; north and temperate regions of Eurasia, almost exterminated in Central Europe |
In early spring, only adult roosters lek, females do not fly to the lek. One-year-old roosters, if they fly to the current, then sit in the trees in silence. The second period begins with the arrival of capercaillie lek, after which, a week later, mating of birds and the height of their lekking are observed. One-year-old males also try to sing. Gluharki choose their own roosters. Often females mate with one capercaillie occupying a site in the center of the current.The third period is the extinction of the current. Gluharki mostly sit on eggs and rarely appear on the current. The old wood grouses stop singing and fly away to molt in the support. During this period, they try to talk 
predominantly one-year-old roosters. The intensity of the display of birds depends on the state of the weather. Capercaillie sing best of all on a clear morning and almost never play on rainy, windy days. Males arrive at the lek in the evening, an hour or two before sunset, and noisily sit down in the trees, each in his own area, about 100 m from each other. The number of males on the current is different - from 4 - 6 to 25-50 or more. The current area varies depending on the number of birds and local conditions - from 4 - 8 to 50-100 hectares. The current begins with a series of clicking sounds. Then, after the main "blow", special hissing sounds follow, similar to the turning of iron objects - capercaillie 
Capercaillie(Tetrao urogallus) - one of the largest representatives of chicken, growing almost from a turkey. The mass of males ranges from 3.5 to 6.5 kg, females - from 1.7 to 2.3 kg. It is a large, clumsy and shy bird. The capercaillie's gait is fast; when searching for food, it often runs along the ground. It rises heavily from the ground, flapping its wings loudly and making a lot of noise. The flight is heavy, noisy, almost direct and short unless absolutely necessary. It usually flies above the forest itself or at the height of half a tree; only in autumn, making more significant movements, it keeps high above the forest.
The capercaillie has pronounced sexual dimorphism. The male is much larger than the female and differs sharply from her in plumage color. Unlike the gray female, it looks black from a distance, but in fact its head, neck, back and sides of the body are grayish-gray with a small dark streaked pattern. The goiter is black with a green metallic sheen. The belly is dark with large white spots or white with sparse black-brown spots. The wings are brown, the tail is black with white blurry spots and a striated pattern.
In the female, the general coloration of the upperparts is yellowish-red in a transverse stripe, with brown and buffy tops of the feathers. The throat is buffy, the goiter is red, sometimes with mottled. The rest of the bottom is light red with streaks, the middle of the belly is almost white. The area of distribution of capercaillie covers coniferous and, in some places, broad-leaved forests from the Scandinavian Peninsula, the British Isles and the Pyrenees to Lake Baikal.
Capercaillie is a real forest bird. Inhabits large massifs of large and old forests of various types, preferring, however, pine forests and oak forests. Most of the year it leads a terrestrial-arboreal way of life, as it feeds on trees, and only during the nesting period does it become a completely terrestrial bird.
In coniferous and coniferous-deciduous forests, capercaillie live settled within a small area, making only minor local movements. From purely deciduous forests for the winter, they regularly migrate to pine forests or to forest areas with an admixture of pine, the needles of which serve as the main food for capercaillie in winter. At the end of winter, the birds return to their nesting places.
The number of capercaillie is low, and everywhere it is steadily decreasing. This sad phenomenon does not exist only where it is under protection. With the first glimpses of spring, usually in the middle - the end of March, the spring revival begins in males. On clear sunny mornings, before starting feeding, they begin to walk in a special current position - with a vertically raised neck and a fully open tail, with wings slightly set aside and lowered, the ends of which, dragging through the snow, leave characteristic furrows. First, males, and then females, increasingly visit the "currents" - special places, usually located in a sparse-stemmed pine forest, where lekking takes place regularly. Capercaillie currents are very permanent, many of them can function for decades. Depending on the number of birds and the nature of the forest, currents can have a variety of sizes. Even at the beginning of our century, currents were known where more than a hundred birds gathered.
Now the lek is considered large if more than 10 males regularly lek on it, and the lek where 3-5 males gather is the most common. Where there are very few capercaillie left, they begin to lek alone, which is not normal for them and usually precedes the complete disappearance of birds from the area. The height of mating activity of capercaillie falls in April. Males flock and converge on the lek in the evening, shortly before sunset, although the time of their evening appearance can be very different. Birds are distributed in their areas and in the coming darkness they begin to sing, sitting on trees. With darkness, the singing subsides, the capercaillie fall asleep on the same branches where they sang; some may still feed on pine needles here before going to bed. The sleep of birds at this time is short, and about an hour before the first glimpses of dawn, in complete darkness, the most active males begin the morning current with the first song. Gradually, all the males who have gathered on the lekking sing, they get excited and perform song after song almost without interruption. As soon as dawn dawns, the males, one by one, begin to fly to the ground with a loud flapping of their wings.
The entire territory of the lekka is usually divided between males into separate sections, and the most convenient of them, usually located in the center, are captured by the most active and strong males over the age of 3 years. Leaking on the ground in the predawn twilight, the males vigilantly guard the boundaries of their sites, and if someone violates them, then this will inevitably be followed by a fight with the owner of the site. The fights of capercaillie are very cruel. With their strong beaks, which can easily bite branches the thickness of a little finger, they can inflict serious wounds, and their wing beats during fights make such a noise that it seems as if a pine tree is collapsing.
In the predawn hours, females appear on the current. They arrive one by one, two by two, sit down along the outskirts of the current, and then descend to the ground to the males they have chosen. It is difficult to say what guides females when choosing males: it is possible that the location of the site plays a significant role. In any case, often most of females, 3-5 each, are concentrated around the central "currents", while there is not a single one in the rest of the plots. As the sun rises, the activity on the lek quickly fades, the capercaillie fly away, and the males, after streaming for some time, scatter or disperse to feed. Where the birds are not disturbed, they can spend the whole day in the immediate vicinity of the current and return to it again in the evening on foot.
The capercaillie song is relatively quiet for such a large bird, it is barely audible at a distance of more than 150 m. The song consists of 2 parts - “tekany” and “turning”. Starting a song, the capercaillie first makes a double click ("teka") like "te-ke ... te-ke ... te-ke ...". The pauses between these clicks shorten rapidly until they merge into a solid short trill that cuts off abruptly, and this is followed by the second part of the song of low hissing sounds, as if someone is brushing a pan. During this “turning” (many believe that these sounds are similar to those heard when sharpening a scythe), the capercaillie loses its hearing, which is what hunters use. The whole song lasts about 5-6 seconds. The reasons for the deafness of the male during the performance of the second part of the song are not yet clear. Perhaps the bird is losing its vigilance due to extreme excitement. Probably, by making hissing sounds, the bird muffles itself, or maybe the reason for this is a special gland in the ear canal, permeated with blood vessels. Swelling during singing from the influx of blood, it can "clog" the ear.
The grouse visit the current comparatively a short time- about 2 weeks. After they start laying eggs and stop appearing on the lek, the males lek for about a month, but every day the excitement of their lek goes out, and, finishing the lek, they sing, no longer raising or opening their magnificent tail.
Glukharka builds a nest not far from the current, usually under the protection of branches, but often openly. The clutch usually contains 7-9 eggs, sometimes up to 16. The female lays eggs at intervals of 24 to 48 hours. Incubation lasts 25-27 days. The mass of a newly hatched chick ranges from 33 to 45 g. In the first autumn, the chicks are far from reaching the size and weight of adult birds; this happens only in the second autumn.
For the winter, birds gather in flocks of 5-25 birds, males often keep separate from females. Capercaillie spend the whole winter in a relatively small area, settling for the night in snowy chambers and feeding almost all daylight hours with a break in the middle of the day. Winter food consists almost exclusively of pine needles or Siberian cedar. An adult male eats about 500 g of needles per day. The summer food of capercaillie is noticeably more diverse and consists mainly of green parts of various herbs, and in autumn the main food is berries. In Siberia, pine nuts are also eaten in autumn.
Capercaillie is a valuable hunting and commercial species. With proper protection and the availability of quiet breeding sites, he can get along well with humans and live even close to large cities.
in Siberia and Far East, east of Lake Baikal and Lena, lives another species of capercaillie - stone capercaillie(T. urogalloides). Males are almost entirely black-brown, with bright white spots on the wings and rump. Females look like females capercaillie, but more gray, and their chest is not red, but blackish-gray. The sizes are somewhat smaller than those of the previous species: males rarely weigh more than 4 kg. Unlike the common one, the stone capercaillie feeds on the shoots and buds of larch trees throughout the winter. Males lek in a similar way, but their song consists of only clicks, very loud and reminiscent of the sound of castanets. These clicks follow one after another with several trills. At the same time, the bird does not lose its hearing, and if it does, then to a very small extent in the final part of the song.
field grouse(Lyrurus tetrix) is perhaps the most famous representative of the grouse bird family. Males are distinguished by their blue-black plumage, on which white mirrors on the wings and white undertail stand out sharply. Females are grayish-brown, motley, very similar to wood grouse, but with white mirrors on the wings, like males. These birds are medium in size, the weight of males is on average 1.2-1.4 kg, females - less than 1 kg.
The black grouse inhabits the forest and forest-steppe zones of Eurasia from the British Isles east to Sikhote-Alin.
This is a semi-sedentary bird, in some places it makes minor seasonal migrations, more regularly expressed in mountainous areas. In some years, mass migrations of black grouse are observed, apparently associated with poor fodder harvest.
Black grouse is an inhabitant of the edges of forests and forest-steppe. In nesting time, it prefers birch forests alternating with grain fields, aspen and linden forests in the vicinity of extensive clearings by burnt forests, forest edges and sparse undergrowth with the obligatory presence of berry bushes and dry places necessary for building nests; deaf tall forests avoids.
In the south of the range, under the influence of plowing of the steppes and the reduction of forests, its range is shrinking, while in the north, due to deforestation, the territory it occupies is gradually expanding.
The settlement of the black grouse is noticeably smaller than that of the capercaillie. If the conditions of existence are favorable, then most of the birds live throughout their lives in a relatively small area, the size of which usually does not exceed 10 km2. However, in the event of a poor harvest of birch catkins for winter food) or with an excessive increase in numbers in some area, black grouse are able to make massive movements, sometimes taking on the character of seasonal migrations.
Mating revival in males begins long before the first thawed patches appear in the sun. A peculiar, reminiscent of the gurgling of overflowing water, the song of a black grouse, the so-called mumbling, can be heard already from the beginning of March. However, the real mating of males begins much later, even later than in capercaillie, in the second half of April - early May, when the snow has already melted from open places. The grouse current is usually located in an open place - in raised bogs, in clearings, but especially often in hay meadows, yellow from last year's grass. In the north, black grouse lek even on the ice of lakes. The number of males on the lek depends on total strength birds in a given area and can range from a few individuals to several dozen birds. Back in the middle of our century, there were currents where more than a hundred males gathered. Now leks are predominant everywhere, where 5-12 males lek, and cases when black grouse lek alone have become noticeably more frequent.
In the midst of mating activity, males lek with exceptional passion, and a good lek, bubbling like a boiling cauldron, can be detected by ear several kilometers away. Males appear on the lekking ground in complete darkness, shortly before dawn, and immediately begin lekking, distributing over their territories. As with capercaillie, each current male has its own specific area on the current, which he actively guards. At the height of the current, skirmishes between neighboring males now and then occur at the boundaries of the plots. The current black grouse stretches its neck and head parallel to the ground, opens its tail wide, slightly sets aside its wings, and in this position moves in small steps around the site, performing its song over and over again. The fully extended tail stands upright or even tips over the back. From time to time, the male straightens up, sticks out his chest and emits a loud hissing chuffy, like “chuffffy”, audible, however, no more than 200-300 m.
Females appear at dawn and first fly along the outskirts of the lek, making inviting sounds, and then head to the center of the lek to the males they have chosen. With the appearance of females, the intensity of male display increases sharply, and with their disappearance, it gradually fades. Current black grouse do not lose their vigilance for a second, and it is extremely difficult to get close to the current at a close distance.
The nesting life of the black grouse proceeds in the same way as that of the capercaillie. Females arrange nests near the lek. The clutch contains mostly 7-9 eggs, although large clutches up to 13 eggs were also found. Incubation period is 23-25 days. The broods first keep in dense grass along the outskirts of meadows near forest edges, and then, when the chicks grow up enough, they move to the berries. In late autumn, flocks are formed, which are both mixed and consisting of either males or females. Winter flocks of black grouse can number several hundred birds, and such a flock spends the whole winter within a relatively small area. Unlike capercaillie and white partridges, black grouse are much less hardy and even with moderate frosts of about -20 ° C they spend 23 hours a day under snow. In such situations, birds have only one feeding, in the morning. Coming out of the snow-covered chambers, the black grouse fly to the nearest birches, quickly fill their crops there and burrow under the snow again.
The black grouse is mainly a herbivorous bird; animal foods are consumed by chicks at an early age, they are of little importance in adults. The set of forages is quite significant: about 80 species of plants and about 30 species of animals are registered in the diet of black grouse from several regions of the European part of Russia. It is especially diverse in spring and summer. At this time, leaves, buds, flowers, seeds of many herbaceous and shrubby plants are eaten in the greatest quantity, the species composition of which varies depending on geographical areas. In winter, birds mainly consume buds, catkins and shoots of birch, alder, willow, aspen, juniper berries, as well as winter pine cones. In the first week, the chicks feed almost exclusively on animals: spiders, beetles, caterpillars, bugs, cicadas, mosquitoes, flies, etc., and later they switch to plant foods.
In nature, the black grouse has quite a few enemies, among which the goshawk and the fox deserve special mention. In winter, chains of fox tracks stretch, as a rule, in those places where black grouse are especially willing to spend the night. However, the main influence on the number of birds is exerted by the weather of the time when the mass hatching of chicks occurs. In recent decades, the number of black grouse has experienced a very strong reduction under the influence of various anthropogenic factors. Granular fertilizers and other agricultural chemicals, as well as power lines, were especially detrimental to birds. All this led to the fact that from a commercial species, black grouse turned into a relatively small bird, hunting for which is prohibited in various regions.
caucasian black grouse(L. mlokosiewiczi) is similar to the common black grouse, but slightly smaller and slightly different in plumage color. In males, it is dull or velvety black, almost without shine, there is no mirror on the wing. The extreme helmsmen are bent more down than to the sides. In the female, the mottles are smaller and uniform, forming a striated pattern.
The Caucasian black grouse is distributed in an extremely limited area - within the alpine belt of the Main Caucasian Range and the Lesser Caucasus, at an altitude of 1500 to 3000 m above sea level.
The Caucasian black grouse inhabits alpine meadows covered with rich vegetation, thickets of rhododendron and undersized birch; in winter it occurs in the subalpine upper forests and on the warms of the lower part of the alpine zone. Leads a more or less sedentary lifestyle, making only minor vertical seasonal movements - in winter, birds descend to upper limit forests or enter it.
The display of the Caucasian black grouse has a number of peculiar features. Not only old, but also young males, still in a motley gray, non-adult outfit, participate in the current. On the current, the roosters either sit quietly, or, lowering their wings and raising their tail almost vertically, jump up to a height of about 1 m, while turning 180 °. The jump is accompanied by a characteristic flapping of wings. The frequency of jumps expresses the degree of excitation of the bird and increases with the appearance of each new rooster or female. If one rooster bounces, then in turn (rarely together) all the others also jump. Usually the current passes in silence, except for the flapping of wings when jumping. Occasionally, roosters click their beaks or emit a short wheezing, reminiscent of the muffled and soft cry of a corncrake.
The lifestyle of this black grouse is in many ways similar to that of the common grouse. Caucasian black grouse spend the winter in the same way as ordinary black grouse. At night, birds burrow under the snow, feed in the mornings and evenings, in the middle of the day they usually rest in the sun, and in bad frosty weather they burrow again under the snow.
Due to its comparatively small number, the Caucasian black grouse, even in the past, has never been of particular importance as an object of hunting. Now the number of this species remains at a satisfactory level only in reserves. Included in the Red Book of Russia.
A few more species of peculiar grouse birds live in North America. So, great steppe grouse(Tympanuchus cupido) inhabits the open prairie and forest-steppe of the central regions North America. In size, it is slightly inferior to the common black grouse: old males usually weigh no more than 1100 g, females are somewhat smaller. In color, males and females are almost indistinguishable - evenly motley, with a striated pattern, especially pronounced on the chest, and a predominance of sand and yellowish-brown tones. This coloration is clearly protective in nature and makes the birds hardly noticeable against the background of burnt grass. Males are easily recognizable due to the peculiar decorating feathers - "ears", growing in two bunches on the sides of the upper part of the neck. During mating, the male raises them forward and upward, acquiring a completely unusual “horned” appearance.
Large steppe black grouse lek on traditional lekeries, where up to several dozen birds gather at the height of the mating season. The main element in the mating ritual of the male is a kind of song, which consists of three following one after another, almost merging humming sounds, like “oooh-uuuu-oooh”, quite loud and audible for more than 3 km. These sounds are amplified by special resonators - protrusions of the distensible esophagus, which, inflating, protrude bare, yellow-orange-colored areas of the skin on the sides of the neck, swelling with two brightly colored bubbles. At the same time, the males hold their head and neck parallel to the ground, putting their “horns” forward.
Previously, large steppe black grouse inhabited all the forest-steppe and steppe spaces of the continent and led a life similar to that of the common black grouse. With the advent of the agricultural population, these birds quickly adapted to human agricultural activities and switched over to predominantly feeding on grain crops in winter so completely that it is now very difficult to establish what they ate in the winter. winter time before the advent of agriculture. At the beginning of the XX century. The great steppe grouse, using the fields of grain crops as the main food base, noticeably increased in number and expanded its range up to the southern regions of Canada, but soon the intensification of agriculture and immoderate hunting gave the opposite result. Currently, this species has survived only in a few places in the midwestern United States, and its numbers have become so small that it was listed in the Red Book of the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
Lesser steppe grouse(T. pallidicinctus) differs from the large one in smaller size, color details, some features of the display, but in general leads about the same lifestyle. It occupies a small area in the central part of the prairies and is now also preserved in very small numbers.
sharp-tailed grouse(T. phasianellus) got its name for two pairs of narrow, sharply elongated feathers in the center of the tail, protruding several centimeters beyond its edge, with the central pair being the longest. The coloration of this species is of the same protective character as that of the steppe grouse, differing only in the details of the pattern and the longitudinal rather than transverse striation of the chest. Males and females are colored the same, but females are somewhat smaller and have a shorter tail. Adult birds, like hazel grouse, have a small crest. This is one of the most common and numerous species of American grouse, distributed from the forest tundra to the prairies and from the Rocky Mountains to the Great Lakes.
The sharp-tailed black grouse is also characterized by group display, and in the mating ritual of males, the most interesting is the so-called "dance". Spreading his open wings and raising his tail vertically, the male rapidly stamps his feet, slowly moving along a complex trajectory, somewhat reminiscent of a clockwork toy airplane. Like the great steppe grouse, the sharp-tailed black grouse has become well accustomed to the new agricultural landscapes for him and also switched to feeding on grain cereals in winter. However, in the north of the range - in Northern Canada and in Alaska - this species still lives in the same conditions as before the discovery of America by Europeans, and in the harsh northern winters leads the same life as our hazel grouse or black grouse.
The most unusual among American grouse birds, as well as the largest of them, is sagebrush grouse(Centrocercus urophasianus). Males have a mass of about 3 kg, females - 1.7 kg. Males and females are painted in a similar way in modest grayish-sand colors, and only on the belly there is a black-brown spot. The sagebrush grouse is notable primarily for the fact that in its distribution and daily life it is closely related to the thickets of sagebrush bushes on the desert foothills of the Rocky Mountains. These plants serve as both shelter and main source of food for him. all year round. Constant feeding on tender leaves of wormwood gradually led to atrophy of the gastric muscle, so powerfully developed in all gallinaceous birds, and the transformation of the stomach into a highly extensible thin-walled organ.
Wormwood grouse are polygamous. Males gather in spring at traditional leks, usually located on hilltops, and as early as the beginning of the 20th century. leks were known, where several hundred birds gathered. The current ritual of males is exceptionally peculiar. There are no ups, no jumps, no song vocalizations. The bird stands almost all the time in the same place, from time to time only stepping over its feet and periodically performing the same procedure, which boils down mainly to exorbitant swelling of the neck. The esophagus of these birds, like that of blue and steppe grouse, is easily distensible. When the male inflates it, he, in turn, presses to the sides, expanding the neck and upper chest so that they look like a huge white collar, from which a small head protrudes, decorated with special thin feathers rising vertically. The white plumage of the lower part of the neck and sides of the chest has another feature - the feathers here are short, with thick rods pointed towards the top and rigid triangular fans, more like scales. Inflating the neck, the male at the same time runs the folds of the wings along these feathers, producing the same sound as if you run a comb with a fingernail. The feathers of the rather long tail are also pointed, and when the tail is open and upright during towing, they stick out in all directions, as on an Indian's headdress.
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