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Greater Prairie-Chicken - Attwater's
[Tympanuchus cupido attwateri]
[Length 15 in. Wingspan 25 in.]
Greater Prairie-Chickens once bred throughout the vast prairies of North America.
Habitat loss has drastically reduced their populations, and one must seek them out at the few remaining grassland areas.
An isolated population exists in central-eastern Texas known as "Attwater's" Greater Prairie-Chicken.
By 2003 there were less than 50 of these birds in the wild.
Captive breeding and re-introduction programs have been implemented to save the population, but progress has been very slow.
Today, the only extant population is at the inland Attwater's Prairie-Chicken National Wildlife Refuge, where captive bred birds have been re-introduced into the wild.
However, this "Attwater's" Greater Prairie Chicken was photographed just before dawn along FM 2040 slightly north of Aransas NWR, Texas, USA.
It may well have been one of the last "wild" birds left in its historic coastal breeding range.
Photo taken through a car windshield (and illuminated mostly by the car's headlights!) with a Nikkor 300mm ED f4.5 lens on Ektachrome 200 film.
(Date: December 1979)
(use image name "prchic2" for inquiries)
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