The post This Chicken Looks Like a Rabbit appeared first on A-Z Animals.
Just when you think you’ve seen all the exotic-looking birds the world has to offer, another one appears on your screen. This time, it’s the Attwater’s prairie-chicken. It’s a dazzling and rare chicken that looks like a cross between a rabbit and an ancient Mesoamerican god. They have vibrant coats, ornate facial features, and engage in elaborate mating displays/rituals. This YouTube video shows just how much these chickens look like rabbits.
The Attwater’s prairie-chicken may look like a bird from outer space, but it’s actually native to the coast regions of Louisiana and Texas. It once enjoyed large numbers, especially in the 20th century. Widespread habitat loss, however, has made the Attwater’s prairie-chicken one of the rarest chickens on Earth. Let’s learn more about this delightful, rabbit-looking bird.
Attwater’s Prairie-Chicken Facts
Male Attwater’s prairie-chickens engage in elaborate sight and sound mating rituals called “booming.”
©Danita Delimont/Shutterstock.com
There’s no chicken quite like the Attwater’s prairie-chicken. A native species of the Gulf Coast, this chicken is hard to forget once you’ve seen it. While females are relatively plain-looking, males resemble peacocks with rabbit ears: they have dazzling black, white, and brown speckled coats, long, pointed ear-like feathers, and large, bright orange sacs on the sides of their faces.
Like other prairie chickens, the Attwater variety subsists on a range of foods, including grass shoots, seeds, insects, and flower petals. They are also food for a range of predators, including hawks, coyotes, skunks, snakes, and raccoons. Typically, Attwater’s prairie-chicken hens lay between 10-14 eggs in ground nests, with at least three per cycle lost to predators. From there, the chicks stay with their mother for about six weeks before venturing out on their own.
Besides the males’ fanciful plumage, the most memorable thing about Attwater’s prairie-chickens is their elaborate mating displays. Between January and mid-May, the birds gather in small groups in open areas to choose suitors. The females sit back and watch the males engage in elaborate dances consisting of struts and stomps. Simultaneously, the males emit “woo-woo”-like sounds from their orange face sacs. This causes the sacs to inflate like accordions and gives the bird its nickname—boomers. It’s such a signature move that several North American Plains Indian traditional dances are based on this mating dance. In this YouTube video, a male engages in some of his stomping dance moves.
Population Decline and Conservation
All prairie chicken males feature dazzling coats, elongated feather pinnae that resemble ears, and large inflatable facial sacs.
©Aaron J Seltzer/Shutterstock.com
The Attwater’s prairie-chicken is rare. There are several subspecies of prairie chicken, however, that once roamed North America’s grasslands in large numbers. These include the aforementioned Attwater’s prairie-chicken, Greater prairie-chickens, and Heath Hens. Each of these chickens has a similar appearance; they are characterized by speckled body feathers. The males, which are sexually dimorphic, have large, prominent feather tufts (pinnae) that resemble ears, as well as orange sacs on the sides of their faces that enlarge during mating displays.
Dwindling Numbers
Within a century, the Attwater’s prairie-chicken population went from hundreds of thousands to less than one hundred individuals.
©Charles Basta/Shutterstock.com
Much like its relatives, the Attwater’s prairie-chicken was once widespread in its native region, the coastal grasslands of Texas and Louisiana. Over a million Attwater’s prairie-chickens lived along the Texas coast, ranging from Corpus Christi north past Galveston Bay in 1900. However, the land was filling up with people who had different needs than the chickens. Beginning at the turn of the 20th century, widespread planting of Chinese tallow trees for the area’s burgeoning soapmaking industry endangered the prairie-chicken’s habitat. This tallow tree (Triadica sebifera) proved to be a particularly aggressive species. It quickly dominated the once-diverse grasslands, turning them into ecosystems with only one species.
This, combined with fire suppression strategies and urbanization, nearly decimated the Attwater’s prairie-chicken. By 1937, an environmental study counted just 8,700 of these chickens remaining in the Texas coastal region. This stark fall from millions to just one percent of its previous population seriously threatened this magnificent bird. It only got worse. In March 1967, it was added to the endangered species list, with only a thousand left in the wild.
Then, inexplicably, in 1999, the global environmental organization The Nature Conservancy permitted new drilling on Texas land close to the Attwater’s prairie-chicken breeding grounds. Within three years, fewer than 50 wild specimens remained there before they disappeared completely. By 2014, around 260 total Attwater’s prairie-chickens remained, with just 100 of them living in the wild.
Captive-Breeding Programs
Hurricane Harvey nearly decimated this chicken in 2017, but conservation efforts have given them a fighting chance.
©angelshot/Shutterstock.com
Despite reaching near extinction, there’s still some hope for this rabbit-looking chicken. In the mid-2000s, several captive-breeding programs were established around Texas. These included programs at the Fossil Rim Wildlife Center, the Abilene Zoo, and the Caldwell Zoo. There was even a captive-breeding flock roaming the grounds of NASA’s Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center near Clear Lake, Texas, thanks to a partnership with the Houston Zoo.
Tragically, the total population declined to just 42 birds in 2016. A year later, Hurricane Harvey nearly killed them all, but numbers are growing. The Houston Zoo released several individuals in 2019, contributing to a gradual increase, with the wild population estimated at around 178 by 2021. The numbers continue to fluctuate, but with proper conservation and a little luck, the Attwater’s prairie-chicken may one day return to its former glory. This YouTube video shows just a hint of that dazzle.
The post This Chicken Looks Like a Rabbit appeared first on A-Z Animals.
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