We have made a few quick visits to Chugwater and Monument Lek over the past couple of days. Reassuringly, we’ve found quite a bit of grouse sign at both leks. Gail and Becca even found 2 males strutting this morning. One of the males was banded, but we haven’t uncovered the band combination sheets yet to learn who he was. This is a much more promising start to the season than last year, where birds were few and far between, and we were considerably into March before the first males even showed up on Monument. This difference is almost certainly weather related; the snow level is a fraction of what it was last year.

The camp is now pretty much set up. Gail fixed the hot water tank, and we’ve got heaters in the office trailer now. The rest of the crew comes tonight and tomorrow. We are even pretty sure the new robot bits will be delivered next week. There is always quite a bit of uncertainty at the beginning of the season; what will work and what won’t, and what plans are we going to have to change mid-stride in order to come away with as much data as possible. I’m sure we will still have many hurdles to clear, but so far, things are going relatively smoothly. (knock on wood!)