May 26, 2005

The Columbian Sharp-tail grouse thrives in the vast rangelands of northwest Colorado; but habitat loss and drought pushed the bird out of its home in southwest Colorado in the early 1960s.

To help assure its survival, the Colorado Division of Wildlife (DOW) is reintroducing the bird back to one of its traditional homes in the Four Corners region. While judging the success of the reintroduction will take a few years, significant changes in the landscape of far western Colorado have bolstered biologists’ confidence that the bird can be re-established in the wide-open spaces near Dove Creek.

Leading the project is avian researcher Rick Hoffman who has studied various species of grouse for 30 years. Retired from the DOW, Hoffman is on special assignment for this project.

A major reason for the reintroduction is to ensure that the birds do not become an endangered species. Wildlife experts are concerned because there is currently only one viable breeding population in the state. Hoffman explained.

We’re taking a proactive approach, Hoffman said. We have developed a detailed conservation plan and we believe we can establish another population. Our action will be looked upon favorably by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Major environmental changes in large tracts of land around Dove Creek have provided the key to the relocation program. In the mid 1990s, due to prolonged drought and economic factors, many farmers took fields out of production. As part of the federal government’s Conservation Reserve Program, farm fields throughout a 150-square-mile area were replanted with a variety of grasses favored by many species of wildlife. Some native shrubs such as serviceberry, choke cherry and hawthorn also grew back at the edges of the fields adding another important habitat element.

When the vegetation took hold, biologists knew that conditions were ripe to reintroduce the Sharp-tailed grouse.

In the fall of 2004, Hoffman and his crew traveled to an area near Hayden in northwest Colorado and trapped 40 males. The birds were transported to near Dove Creek and released in an area where they could establish new leks the breeding grounds used in the spring. Then in April, 40 females were captured near Hayden and released at the lek sites. To track their progress, biologists fitted 26 females with radio collars.

A similar trap-and-release plan is scheduled starting in the fall.

No one has ever done it this way, Hoffman said. So far I am very pleased. We got very good survival rates in the males that we released in the fall, and it looks like the females found the leks. If they breed successfully, we’ll have a lot of grouse around in a hurry. They are prolific.

The movement of the females will be monitored using radio telemetry. When they stop moving around, researchers will know they are sitting in their nests. The approximate location of the nests will be marked with GPS coordinates so that they can be located quickly. By late May eggs will hatch and researchers will be able to check the nests to determine how many chicks left with the hens.

We’ll be starting a whole new population here. If our techniques work this will be a model for the whole country, Hoffman said.

The goal of the DOW’s Columbian Sharp-tailed grouse conservation plan is to establish two additional breeding populations in the state. Hoffman estimates the program for southwest Colorado will cost just $40,000.

That’s a very cheap price to pay to prevent them from being listed as a threatened species in the future.