Colorado Grouse

Each spring, as dawn breaks across the high plains and mountains of Colorado, the quiet is broken by one of nature’s most astonishing spectacles—the booming, drumming, and dancing of grouse on their ancestral leks. This immersive journey traverses all four corners of the state in search of these legendary displays, from the Greater and Gunnison Sage-Grouse to the Sharp-tailed Grouse and both Greater and Lesser Prairie-Chickens.

We begin in the snow-dusted Rocky Mountains, where we’ll climb to Loveland Pass to seek the elusive White-tailed Ptarmigan, before continuing to Gunnison, home to the rare and endangered Gunnison Sage-Grouse. In the dramatic landscapes of Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park and Colorado National Monument, we’ll find Dusky Grouse, Pinyon Jay, Lewis’s Woodpecker, and Juniper Titmouse among the cliffs and canyons.

As we journey east through the Pawnee National Grassland and the rolling plains of Kansas, the show intensifies—each morning brings a new stage and a new species. Watch Sharp-tailed Grouse twirl in wind-up bursts of motion, Greater Prairie-Chickens inflate glowing orange air sacs as the prairie echoes with their calls, and Lesser Prairie-Chickens shimmer and leap across the shortgrass.

Complementing these avian performances are herds of Pronghorn, Elk, and Mule Deer, and the chance to spot Ferruginous Hawk, Prairie Falcon, or a trio of Rosy-Finches in alpine snowfields. With crisp air, stunning vistas, and the magic of the leks at dawn, this is the American West at its most alive.

A diverse journey through shortgrass prairies, sagebrush basins, red-rock canyons, mountain forests, and alpine tundra, showcasing the full range of Colorado’s iconic landscapes and wildlife.