This morning had to be spent re-running the standard lek count route in the desert, making up for counts that were ruined by eagles on Monday.

Today was calm, which kept the eagles grounded until the warming breezes came up. Managed to get all five leks on the route counted without any problems, for a total of 279 cocks and 25 hens. A little better than the 252 cocks counted on 17 April last year. That is a little surprising, since we had such a dry summer last year. I expected production to be low and the number of birds to be down slightly. Apparently not.

Flushed a loggerhead shrike off a reflector post while enroute to lek #5. I like shrikes, the masked bandits of the avian world. They have the unusual habit of stockpiling their food by skewering it on thorns and barbs, to be consumed later. First became aware we had shrikes in the desert when I found the head of a horny toad stuck on a barbed wire fence. Shrikes weren't supposed to be here... no small trees for them to nest in. But I figured out pretty quick that they were nesting in our spiny greasewood and our sagebrush trees (Artemisia tridentata tridentata). The latter is the Basin sagebrush, which quite often gets 6-9' tall with a 6-8" trunk. Took years to convince the bird "experts" that shrikes nested in this country and needed to be considered in environmental impacts.

After the fifth lek of the standard route, we hightailed it to the west and managed to find birds still on a sixth strutting ground. Seventy cocks, a record for that lek. Then north to yet another lek (after a running break for the heelers). Lots of birds here, too. So then quickly (five miles in six minutes on dirt roads) on to an eighth lek. This one, however, was empty. We hiked out onto the lek to see if it had been used, and found lots of tracks and droppings. Also found two separate feather piles. Somebody had grouse for breakfast here, twice.

As is normal, both feather piles were from cocks, and both included the crop. Both eagles and coyotes reject this organ, which consists of little more than a leathery sack stuffed with sagebrush leaves (some 99+% of adult grouse diets). I love the smell of sagebrush (fortunately... imagine being in this country and hating sage), but the smell of sagebrush in a grouse's crop is even better. Really! Something in their digestive juices adds a sweetness to it. Suggested to the wife that the crops could be made into grouse potpourri, but she called the idea gross potpourri.

The interesting part about the feather piles is that they were both fresh. As in "this morning" fresh. One grouse had been plucked, eviscerated and then the carcass removed (=eagle kill) while the other was consumed on site, with crushed pieces of bone and fresh intestines (with the usual tapeworms) scattered about (=coyote kill). Bad morning for the grouse. But did the predators hit at the same time? If not, the coyote kill would have had to have been plenty early in the morning in order for it to have eaten its bird and for there still to be time for more grouse to come back for the eagle to hunt.

This lek normally has about 20 males in attendance, and they've been strutting for about 50 days so far. With at least two fatalities. Would you go courting if you knew your chances of dying in the act were about 4 percent? And your chance of actually having sex was only about two percent?

Of course if you could have sex during only two months of the year, you might feel differently.

Anyway, I collected the rectrices (large tail feathers) from both feather piles. Don't really know why. I have plenty already, but they just look so collectible. Anybody want some bloody grouse tail feathers?

After another running break for the heelers, we scouted the roads to more strutting grounds. Two-track roads last well in this sandy country, but the bladed county roads get washed out easily by snowmelt. Someone had marked all the bad spots on the main county road with stakes and something red. Red flagging tape, red rags, and in one case, a red bucket. Nice folks.

Dispatch called, asking for assistance near town with a deer hit on the Interstate. Advised them I was an hour and 20 minutes away, and turned back. Saw vehicle tracks on a shortcut road that crosses the alkali lakes, something you normally don't want to do in the springtime, so I followed to save some time. Just barely missed driving into an unmarked 2' deep ditch across the road. Vehicle before us left 6" ruts in the sand as they slammed on the brakes to avoid the washout. That's why there were two sets of tire tracks. I passed on the favor by marking the washout with a couple posts and an old tire from a nearby corral, and then went home the smart way.

Had to use air conditioning on the highway. First time this year. Warm for April.

The map didn't help. Corky's truck is still there.

Now the RP's (reporting party's) directions to the injured deer said it was hit in the rear on the eastbound lane at the interchange at milepost 213, and had drug itself onto the westbound ramp. Does that make sense to you? How does an eastbound lane have a westbound ramp? One of the wardens from town had already tried to find the animal, but I heard her give up on the radio with "negative contact." She couldn't find it.

No wonder, there is no interchange at MP 213. At 211 and 214, yes, but not at 213. And certainly no eastbound lane with a westbound ramp. So I started to drive the shoulders from 211 to 214. And spotted a Highway Dept truck. Driving off the road towards the fence. Dragging something. Dragging a deer. A dead deer.

But it was a buck deer, with antlers. That means it died way back before antlers were shed in January, not the fresh deer I was looking for. But I followed them anyway, and pulled up unnoticed as the one worker prepared to untie the carcass they were just dragging off the roadway.

"Don't you know deer season is closed?"

You should have seen him jump.

Anyway, to make a long story short, they had found the deer I was looking for (at MP 215, not 213, and on the railroad overpass, not an interchange). As is normal at interstate speeds, the injuries were fairly quickly fatal. They had drug the deer carcass off the road, as they were doing with this buck. No wonder the warden couldn't find it.

But you should have seen him jump.