This morning was the first run of my route of standardized strutting ground counts in the desert, twice delayed by snow and rain. Five leks that I count several times through the latter half of the strutting season, trying to get an idea what the maximum number of males in attendance is each year.

This is year nine.

And on the five leks, all counted between 06:19 and 08:04 (separated by mad dashes down dirt and paved roads), the count was:

365 cocks, 146 hens.

The highest cock count in all those nine years (although last year was close, at 362 cocks).

One hundred and sixty-seven of those cocks were on the same strutting ground. Took over 17 minutes just to count it the required three times.

And we've got weeks of the strut yet to go.