Size: The black grouse is a large bird with males measuring roughly around 60 centimetres in length and weighing 1,100–1,250 grams, sometimes up to 2,100 grams, with females approximately 45 cm and weighing 750–1,100 grams.

Vocalisations: Their song consists of a long, dove-like bubbling coo or murmur.

Habitat: It can be met in various types of swamps, scrubby swampy meadows, deciduous and mixed forests with clearings.

Behaviour: They feed on berries, shoots and stems of cranberries, bog bilberries, myrtleberries. Black grouse have a very distinctive and well-recorded courtship ritual. They will display to signal their territory and vigour by fanning out their elaborate lyre-shaped tails and inflating their necks on designated open ground called a lek. Females usually stay in the periphery of the lek alone or in small groups during this time. Grouse are polygamous birds – each female can mate with several males, and vice versa. The grouse has many natural enemies. Adults are preyed upon by martens and magpies; nests are destroyed by foxes and wild boar. Nestlings are killed by hawks and martens. But all this does not harm the population.

Photo: Māris Kreicbergs, pixabay.com