Black Grouse

Common Name: Black Grouse

Latin Name: Tetrao tetrix

Family: Tetraonidae

The black grouse is primarily a bird of the moorland fringe requiring a mosaic of different habitats including rough grassland, pastures, heather moorland, hay meadows and scrub woodland. It was only decades ago that black grouse were widespread in the Dales with small populations occurring where there were suitable areas of habitat along the moorland edge. The population increased quite dramatically in the late 1970s and early 1980s when young, recently planted conifer plantations provided ideal nesting and chick rearing habitat. This was only temporary, as the canopy closed in the plantations they became unsuitable and populations declined in line with national and regional trends.

Black grouse are probably best known for their elaborate courtship displays during the spring. Males will gather at traditional communal display sites known as leks. Here they perform with the wings drooped and the tail fanned out, accompanied by a loud dove-like cooing and bubbling call that is intended to attract females. The peak of lekking activity is normally around dawn and to a lesser extent at dusk. The females that are attracted to the lek will normally mate with a dominant male and then disperse to the surrounding area to raise their young on their own.

It is during the spring that many birdwatchers set out to try and see black grouse at a lek. At this time of year the birds are also extremely susceptible to disturbance and so all would-be lek watchers are strongly advised to play their part in black grouse conservation by following the RSPB black grouse birdcatchers' code of conduct.

Following widespread population declines across many areas of northern England, the North Pennines Black Grouse Recovery Project was set up in 1996. The project monitors black grouse and acts as an advisory body to help and assist landowners to manage their land in the best way possible for black grouse. Since the start of the project, the decline of the black grouse in the north of England has been halted and the results of positive management work are beginning to show with an increase in the population size.

Management work in the core black grouse areas has resulted in a significant increase in numbers in recent years with the total number of lekking black grouse in the Yorkshire Dales National Park increasing from 51 males in 1997 to 76 males in 2003. Although black grouse have disappeared from a number of formerly occupied areas of the Dales, there are tentative signs that they may be slowly spreading into other formerly occupied areas.

Links:

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Black Grouse Species Action Plan (opens in new window)

Websites:

Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (opens in new window)