Comeback possibilities for sharp-tailed grouse in western Montana

Scientists along backroads in the Blackfoot Valley have been seen holding up radio telemetry antennas. Instead of tuning into their favorite station, they could be dialing in a sharp-tailed grouse, part of a massive reintroduction plan.

Sharp-tailed grouse were once the most abundant grassland bird in western Montana, as they are east of the Continental Divide today. For unknown reasons, the flocks began declining in the 1940s and the last known sharp-tailed grouse sighting in western Montana was in 2000 in the Blackfoot Valley. The sharp-tailed species are also locally or regionally extinct in Kansas, Illinois, California, Oklahoma, Iowa, Nevada, New Mexico and Oregon.

Through partnerships with Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, MPG Ranch in the Bitterroot Valley, University of Montana, private landowners, volunteers, the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes and sportsman groups, work is underway to reintroduce sharp-tailed grouse to the Blackfoot Valley, Tobacco Root area and the Bitterroot Valley.

In 2012 Lewis Young, a former FWP wildlife biologist, approached the director of the MPG Ranch, a conservation restoration and ecology center near Florence, and suggested that sharp-tailed grouse reintroduction might work in western Montana. Young had extensive experience with sharp-tailed grouse restoration efforts following the damming of the Kootenai River by the Libby Dam, which created Lake Koocanusa and flooded sharptail habitat in the Tobacco Valley near Eureka in 1972.

"He handed the baton to all of us," Beau Larkin, MPG Ranch project manager, said of Young.

Partnerships were formed, landowners contacted, permits obtained from FWP and the work began, starting with habitat and population modeling performed by lab students in Lance McNew's rangeland and wildlife graduate classes at Montana State University.

Throughout the project MSU graduate students worked with the reintroduction program to fulfill their PhD programs and continued rangeland modeling.

"It benefits the Fish and Wildlife Department to have the student research projects," Kristina Wiggins, FWP field coordinator said. "It's been very beneficial to work with Montana State University on this."

Habitat studies showed that the large contiguous swaths of grassland needed for sharptails existed in the Blackfoot Valley near Helmville, in the northern parts of the Bitterroot Valley and the Flint Creek Valley near Drummond. Population studies showed that with around 300 birds in a location, there would be 95% confidence of a sustainable population for 50 years.

Genetic studies done by Ben Deeble, a private nonprofit contractor and president of Big Sky Upland Bird Association, showed that the western Montana sharptails were the same species as those in eastern Montana, rather than the Colombian sub-species found in Washington and Oregon. This opened the door for relocating birds from eastern Montana.

Relocation efforts began in the fall of 2021 with 75 males released in the Blackfoot Valley. The fall introduction gave them time to choose a lek location, or a generational breeding ground where sharptails congregate for breeding in the spring. Interestingly enough, the transplanted males established leks on or near the original leks used by sharptail populations up until the 2000 local extinction.

The permit allows for up to 180 birds to be moved yearly to reach the population size. In case of weather, bird health in eastern Montana or other calamities, the permit allows 10 years to complete the movement of birds.

During breeding season in April and May the sharptails are trapped in a lek at a ratio of one male per two females, according to the reintroduction plan. Birds are outfitted with leg bands showing their origin and the date. Females are given a solar-powered geotracing device that could last up to two years for data collection.

Landowners play a critical role in reintroduction efforts. Much of the sharptail habitat is on area ranches or can be accessed across private to public land.

"None of these efforts would be possible without the cooperation of the landowners," Wiggins said.

Trapping begins before sunrise, and the relocated birds are transported by volunteers and released by sundown the same day at their new lek in western Montana. Trapping happens continuously throughout the 30 day breeding season. Field techs move across central and eastern Montana so any one population is not severely affected by the removal of birds.

Typically the males stay at the lek throughout the breeding season, like single men at a bar, said Deeble. Females visit the lek one to five times and then travel within two and a half kilometers to select a nesting site. Hens nest and rear the young on their own.

Some relocated hens have exhibited rather extensive travel, occasionally circling the introduction zone in a 20 kilometer circle. One hen flew from Florence to the Garrison area to nest in 2024, said Larkin.

"We won't really know what normal is until we're looking at a population that was raised here in western Montana," Larkin said. "We don't plan to trap and outfit them with transmitters so we'll figure out our data collection system when the time comes."

Exact reasons for the decline of sharptails in western Montana are unknown and researchers believe that loss of habitat plays into it. Sharptails require extensive grasslands and with the advent of fire restrictive policies conifer trees spread, filling in some of the grasslands and mountain passes that sharptails commonly moved through. This isolated smaller populations of birds, possibly leading to inbreeding. Inbreeding could have weakened the productivity of eggs, resulting in less and weaker chicks being produced.

Sharptails depend on consistent areas of bunchgrass-shrub stands for nesting and brood rearing. These are the kinds of landscapes normally developed for agriculture, commercial or residential development and even power generation, such as Lake Koocanusa, which wiped out an entire population of sharptails when constructed.

"Honestly the thing I love most about having watched this bird for 30 years is the places they live," Deeble said. "It's the best of Montana rangeland and producing land, and the people that operate on it making a living. It's been a tremendous experience. The places I've gotten to go see sharptails have really been special ones. The Blackfoot has been at the top of that list."

Reports of sharp-tailed grouse sightings in the Blackfoot Valley, or anywhere in western Montana, can be provided to Mikel Newberg, FWP field coordinator, at 406-438-0464.