It took all afternoon, but we now have one lek ready for recording. Preacher Lek is relatively compact, so made it easy to surround the main display area with mics. The only tricky aspect was that we had moved the observation blind from the lek itself to a nearby hill. This meant we needed a lot more cable. We decided to try something new- rather than using single lengths, we plugged one cable into another to help span the distance.

Unfortunately it isn’t as simple as unspooling the cables. Sage-grouse, like some other birds, show an aversion to snake-like objects. We have to bury the cables under the lek surface. This involves a lot of work with picks and shovels.







Erin took a break from the cables to start clearing some of last year’s cowpies off the lek.



It all went relatively smoothly except for ooonnnneee little cable that someone layed out backwards. It was a long day, especially after fixing that one mistake, but nice to get that checked off the list!