It’s e-lek-tric! Take a moment to boogie-woogie with an American bird like no other: the sage grouse. “Winters on the grasslands of Montana are long, but dancing sage grouse signal the arrival of spring. In March and April, these birds gather at colonial dancing grounds called ‘leks.’ Males puff up, strut around, and use their wings and air sacs to produce a mind-boggling sequence of sounds and movements. Females watching nearby select the best males, based on criteria only they know. After mating, they return to the protective cover of the sagebrush sea to lay their eggs and raise their young. “Sage grouse need solitude and large expanses of healthy sagebrush steppe to survive. In the past decades, energy development, overgrazing and invasive species have taken their toll. Sage grouse once numbered in the millions, but only around 200,000 of these birds remain today.”—Andy Boyce, conservation ecologist, Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute DISCOVER THE AMERICAN PRAIRIE: https://s.si.edu/34X2QwH. #NatZooZen #BringtheZootoYou #ClosedButStillCaring
