{"id":17114,"date":"2013-07-24T04:00:40","date_gmt":"2013-07-24T10:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=17114"},"modified":"2013-07-20T17:25:43","modified_gmt":"2013-07-20T23:25:43","slug":"dusky-grouse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2013\/07\/24\/dusky-grouse\/","title":{"rendered":"Dusky Grouse"},"content":{"rendered":"

Historically, Blue Grouse have been divided into two major groups – Dusky Grouse and Sooty Grouse.\u00a0 But based on recent mitochondrial DNA sequencing studies as well as on behavioral and distribution information, both groups\u00a0are now considered to be separate species.<\/p>\n

This post is about some Dusky Grouse I found last week\u00a0near the top of Bountiful Peak at an elevation of approximately 9000 feet.\u00a0\u00a0I’m always slightly surprised to find these birds at such high elevations but a little research told me that\u00a0their habitat includes elevations as high as 11.000 feet.\u00a0 Though these birds have a restricted geographic range (mountainous areas of western North America)\u00a0they have a wide range of breeding habitats.<\/p>\n

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\"dusky<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a01\/2500, f\/6.3, ISO 500, 1.4 tc, natural light<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

On Bountiful Peak these grouse live in extremely dense habitat so your best chance of photographing them in the clear is when they cross\u00a0a gravel road.\u00a0 That also gives you a good look at those\u00a0impressively stout feet and legs.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"dusky<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a01\/2000, f\/6.3, ISO 500, 1.4 tc, natural light<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

I saw several groups of juveniles cross the road as they followed an adult.\u00a0 Only the young birds have the red crown.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"dusky<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a01\/1600, f\/6.3, ISO 500, 100-400 @285mm, natural light<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Often when I’ve seen these birds the tail is held almost horizontally but as they crossed the road most of these grouse raised their tails to a high angle.\u00a0 Perhaps it’s a warning signal when they feel vulnerable to a potential threat (only a guess on my part).<\/p>\n

The roadside setting for these images isn’t the best but since this species has such a restricted range I thought some of my readers\u00a0would be interested in seeing a bird that might be unfamiliar to them.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

Note: I’m on the road again for a few days and I’ll have no computer access\u00a0so I won’t be able to respond to any comments in a\u00a0timely fashion, though I do enjoy reading\u00a0those comments\u00a0in the email notifications I get on my phone.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Historically, Blue Grouse have been divided into two major groups – Dusky Grouse and Sooty Grouse. But bases on recent mitochondrial DNA sequencing studies as well as on behavioral and distribution information, both groups are now considered to be separate species.<\/p>\n

Continue reading<\/span><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17116,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[334,1585],"tags":[868,1582,1586,867,190,870,869,311],"class_list":["post-17114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-birds","category-dusky-grouse-upland-game-birds","tag-blue-grouse","tag-bountiful-peak","tag-dendragapus-obscurus","tag-dusky-grouse","tag-juvenile","tag-skyline-drive","tag-sooty-grouse","tag-utah-2"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/dusky-grouse-5969-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-4s2","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}