Author: Anne White | Published: April 3, 2025 | Category: How-To
This article originally appeared in The Bulletin on March 27, 2025.
Where, when and how to observe sage-grouse lek in spring.
Each year as the crisp winter chill yields to the warming promise of emerging spring, greater sage-grouse congregate in the early dawn light to dance. In this annual tradition, male sage-grouse strut on flat clearings in the sagebrush called “leks,” loyally returning to the same location every spring for their entire life. With their tail feathers fanned and wings brushing against their chest, these flamboyant performers rapidly inflate and deflate yellow air sacs on their chest to emit an utterly distinctive echoing sound. The males will display for hours every morning, week after week, in their tireless attempt to impress females watching these choreographed exhibitions from the cover of sagebrush around the lekking ground.
Where are they?
Southeastern Oregon contains some of the most intact and highest quality sage-grouse habitat remaining in the American West, with Oregon’s Owyhee Canyonlands hosting the highest density of leks in the state. The McDermitt Caldera, in particular, supports nearly 100 known leks in the caldera and adjacent Trout Creek Mountains. Several new leks were recently identified in the area, confirming the importance of the vast, healthy expanse of rolling sagebrush steppe in the caldera to sage-grouse.
Courtship season
Although sage-grouse are well camouflaged in the High Desert, the males stand out during their seasonal courtship displays, making the breeding season, from early March to mid-May, a unique and popular opportunity to see this charismatic species.
Know the dance
Observing dancing sage-grouse requires persistence and planning. Reaching the Owyhee and the McDermitt Caldera is likely to require a long drive from just about anywhere, and late-season snow or heavy rain in March and April can make access roads impassable. Sage-grouse are sensitive to disturbance and may abandon a lek if approached too closely or startled by loud noises, so watching a lek requires arriving before dawn, often in freezing temperatures, and watching from afar until all of the grouse have left the lek for the day.
An iconic species native to Oregon’s High Desert, the greater sage-grouse is also an indicator species, meaning their population status represents the overall health of the sagebrush ecosystems they inhabit. This means that habitat loss could pose serious threats to their survival and conservation management is essential to preserve leks. This is why Oregon Natural Desert Association has been working for decades to conserve sage-grouse and their habitat, and the hundreds of other plants and animals that depend on sagebrush ecosystems.
Conservation
More must be done to save sage-grouse. With community support, Oregon Natural Desert Association is engaged in ambitious efforts to protect, defend and restore millions of acres of public land that encompass some of the most important habitat for the species in Oregon.
To protect sage-grouse, Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife does not publicize lek locations. For those interested in observing the birds in action, the state organizes an Adopt-a-Lek program that trains community volunteers to check in on dancing sage-grouse in remote areas of Southeastern Oregon and report what you see to the statewide effort to track sage-grouse populations. For more information, contact adopt.a.lek@gmail.com.
—Malcolm Costello is retired from a career in software and enjoys gravel biking and volunteering with the Oregon Natural Desert Association.
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