I didn't notice it until the first lek.

I arrived before sunrise, checking a new spot that the grouse started using last year. And had parked at just the right angle to count birds outside my open window.

Problem was, if I wanted a picture of the sunrise

or the first rays of the day shining through a grouse's tail

I had to crawl halfway out the window and lean across the hood to take my shots.

And my hands got cold. As in, numbing cold. So, as I started the truck up to head for strutting ground number two, I checked the truck's thermometer.

16 degrees.

That's Fahrenheit, folks.

Brrrr.

On the drive back, after checking all five leks for the day, I noticed we had gotten up to a whopping 31 degrees. That's two and a half hours after sunrise.

Brrrr.

And I wasn't the only one to notice the cold. It must be rough, spending the night and early morning working hard at your shift on the strutting ground, to finally take a break for drink at the local watering hole with your buds...

Only to find it frozen. Solid.

Even a small waterfall on the way home was frozen. Or half frozen, anyway.

You may have noticed I've been using the word "I" a lot this week, rather than "we". That's because, most mornings, I've been alone.

No heelers.

Yes, they were enjoying the opportunities to sleep in, but the main reason was because I was in the part of the country where you find these:

And it looks like there's a new guy setting these poison guns out. The ones I saw were almost in the road, right where the heelers would drag race. And the little warning signs (which heelers cannot read)

were right there, not several meters away like before. Basically, if you're close enough to read this sign, your dog is probably already dead. Every getter had a cow bone nearby, too. I assume as an added attractant for coyotes walking the road (which they do).

So. No heelers. We'll see if they want to go to the desert tomorrow morning.

And just because it's a neat shot...

While sitting at lek number three, I glassed south to lek number five, which has been empty for many years. (They basically gave up that site for lek number four. Which got hit hard by eagles, and soon they abandoned that also, and use site three. Straddling the Continental Divide.)

Anyway, on lek number five, from over a mile off, I saw something white. Looking just like the head of a male grouse peeking out over a sagebrush plant.

But it didn't move.

So, off I went to investigate. Arriving, I found a bird all right, but not a grouse.

A burrowing owl.

As I scribbled my notes and recorded our location, I heard a thundering outside my window. Looking up just in time to see a herd of pronghorn stampeding across the sage.

Just missing the cold little owl.

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