Greater Prairie Chickens are a bird of large prairie landscapes. They can be seen displaying in communal areas called leks at dawn during early spring. The males have large orange air-sacs on their neck that they inflate and use to produce an eerie booming sound while they strut and dance to attract female mates.
Back to topNesting & Family
After mating, females nest in tall grasses and brood and care for young on their own. Greater Prairie Chickens were once found throughout Iowa, but habitat loss and hunting lead to their disappearance from the state in the 1950s.
Now only a small restored population of Prairie Chickens can be found in Southern Iowa. The best place to see these birds is at the Kellerton Bird Conservation Area viewing platform, which overlooks a lek site, from late March to early May.
Back to topPrairie Chicken Restoration
In the 1880s Great Prairie Chickens (Tympanuchus cupido pinnatus) were the most abundant gamebird on Iowa’s prairies and they were common nesters in the state until the early 1900s. Bags of 25-50 a day were common and some hunters took as many as 200 a day. By 1878, Iowa’s lawmakers were concerned that prairie chickens were being over harvested and limited the daily bag to 25 birds per person. This is believed to be the first time daily limits were used to regulate harvest.
Additional restrictions continued to be implemented as the population continued to decrease with 1915 as the last year a hunting season on prairie chickens was held. Agricultural land use was also contributing to the decline of prairie chickens, and the loss of grassland continued after the overharvesting was ended. The last known record of nesting prairie chickens was in 1952.
During the 1980s, two attempts were made to reintroduce prairie chickens in Iowa by capturing birds in Kansas and releasing them, first in the Loess Hills and then at the Ringgold Wildlife Area in southern Iowa on the Missouri border. The Loess Hills reintroduction failed but the Ringgold effort was at least partially successful as the released birds persisted after flying themselves south to Dunn Ranch in Harrison County, MO.
With the Dunn Ranch success in mind, another restoration was attempted in the early 1990s at a few locations in Ringgold and surrounding counties. This time the birds persisted and established the Kellerton Lek which has been their primary booming ground since that time. The population in this area and in northern Missouri did slowly decline, however, and in 2012, the DNR established the Iowa Management Plan for Greater Prairie Chickens. The plan called for an infusion of new birds into the region and from 2012 to 2017 prairie chickens were trapped in Nebraska and released in Iowa and Missouri. For now, we continue to monitor this small population.
You can read in more detail about the reintroduction efforts and see the results of the annual surveys in our Wildlife Population and Harvest Trends Report.
Back to topPrairie-chicken Sightings Wanted
In order to ensure this species stays in Iowa we need to know how prairie chickens are distributed in Southern Iowa. Sightings of prairie chickens are possible in Adair, Madison, Adams, Union, Clarke, Taylor, Ringgold, Decatur and Wayne Counties.
If you see any prairie chickens, whether it is on a booming ground or was flushed out of some grass, we would like to hear about it. Call Stephanie Sheperd at 515-230-6599 or e-mail stephanie.shepherd@dnr.iowa.gov. You can also fill out this online form.
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