Endangered
Gunnison Grouse
Centrocercus minimus
The Gunnison grouse, Gunnison sage-grouse or lesser sage-grouse is a grouse endemic to the United States.
The bird
The bird measures 46–56 cm (18–22 in) in length and weighs 1–2.43 kg (2.2–5.4 lb) The Gunnison grouse, Gunnison sage-grouse or lesser sage-grouse is a grouse endemic to the United States.
Range and habitat
Gunnison sage-grouse occur in seven counties in southwestern Colorado and one county in southeastern Utah. It was once found in Arizona, New Mexico, and Oklahoma, but is now extirpated in those states. Gunnison sage-grouse are dependent on sagebrush-dominated habitats.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Breeding
Gunnison sage-grouse are notable for their elaborate courtship rituals. Groups of females observe these displays and select the most attractive males with that to mate.
Only a few males do most of the breeding. Leks are generally open areas adjacent to dense sagebrush stands, and the same lek may be used by grouse for decades.
In crisis
It is restricted in range to southwestern Colorado and extreme southeastern Utah, with the largest population residing in the Gunnison Basin region in Colorado. Following petitions, the species was proposed for listing under the Endangered Species Act by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, and was eventually protected as a threatened species starting on December 22, 2014. The known population size of this species remains quite small, and it was estimated that fewer than 4,000 individuals existed in when the species was successfully protected under the Act.
A 2019 survey found the population in Colorado to be reduced to an estimated 1,800 birds with only around 429 reproductive males, a record low for the species since surveys began.
Gunnison Grouse is Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Gunnison Grouse, Wikidata item Q1261158. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
