Each morning, we watch sage grouse on several leks in the area. Males gather at these sites to display in hopes of attracting females to mate with. They faceoff and fight for territory, and strut around inflating air sacs(part of their esophagus), holding up their tails, and making all kinds of noises, many of which make them sound rather like pigs.
The females, for their part, show up much less frequently, and wander around the lek, sometimes showing as much interest in eating sage as the strutting males. Often times, the show up, mate, and leave before seven a.m., leaving the males to strut pointlessly for several hours more. On most leks, one male gets the majority of the females (he is referred to as the master cock), and the other birds sometimes resort to copulating with cow pies instead, which is rather amusing to see.
Males sometimes fight for territory, as these two are doing. Through a scope, these fights just look like a frenzy of flapping wings, but in slow motion its possible to see that they are really delivering some powerful blows with their wings.
Each morning, we watch sage grouse on several leks in the area. Males gather at these sites to display in hopes of attracting females to mate with. They faceoff and fight for territory, and strut around inflating air sacs(part of their esophagus), holding up their tails, and making all kinds of noises, many of which make them sound rather like pigs. 
The females, for their part, show up much less frequently, and wander around the lek, sometimes showing as much interest in eating sage as the strutting males. Often times, the show up, mate, and leave before seven a.m., leaving the males to strut pointlessly for several hours more. On most leks, one male gets the majority of the females (he is referred to as the master cock), and the other birds sometimes resort to copulating with cow pies instead, which is rather amusing to see. 
Males sometimes fight for territory, as these two are doing. Through a scope, these fights just look like a frenzy of flapping wings, but in slow motion its possible to see that they are really delivering some powerful blows with their wings.
