PRAIRIE CHICKENS 

 OF KANSAS 



Introduction 



THE GREATER prairie chicken is a two-pound gallinaceous bird, 

 of the grouse family ( Tetraonidae ) , formerly common but 

 now rare or absent from many parts of its former range. Kansas, 

 fortunately, still has extensive areas suitable for this bird, and is 

 one of the four states having the largest number of the greater 

 prairie chicken. The Dakotas and Nebraska are the other states. 

 This bird is popular with hunters; other persons also take pride 

 in the fact that sizeable flocks persist in parts of the State. But, 

 what caused the bird to disappear in many areas when it remained 

 in others? Can it be preserved? Can it be managed so that a 

 part of the annual increase can be harvested as game, at intervals, 

 without depleting the breeding stock? These and other ques- 

 tions had occurred to many Kansans. At the University of Kan- 

 sas, graduate students Lester Lew Henry and the late Wilbur S. 

 Long had gathered considerable information concerning this game 

 bird. Naturally, therefore, the greater prairie chicken was chosen 

 for one of the initial studies when the State Biological Survey of 

 Kansas was reactivated in 1949. 



Actually there are two species of prairie chickens and both occur, 

 even today, in Kansas. The lesser prairie chicken, Tympanuchus 

 pallidicinctus (Ridgway), lives in the southwestern prairies (see 

 Figure 1). It is so uniform in size, color and bodily proportions 

 throughout its range that no geographic populations are recognized 

 as separate subspecies. 



The greater prairie chicken, Tympanuchus cupido (Linnaeus), 

 occurs to the eastward of the other species (see Figure 1). Three 

 geographic variants ( subspecies ) are recognized. The first of these 



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