> The first bird was in tall grass and the feature that struck me
>was the baring extended down the central portion of the tail with outer
>feathers black and lower, lateral aspects of abdomen white. The second
>bird was on a log and was a bit more showy. I could see the central
>feathers were black (but could this be positional?) and then it fanned.
>The entire rear view was black. The white tips reminded me of the "eyes"
>on a peacocks tail, they appeared to be on the lateral feather tips that
>were superimposed on the black fan. Beaks on both birds were short and
>stout, and both had small reddish/brown eye patches.

Mary, if you saw white spots superimposed *on* the tail, rather than at its
very tip, you were seeing a Spruce Grouse. Take a look at the "Franklin's
Grouse" in the NGS field guide. Is that what you mean? No other grouse
has white spots *on* the tail, and a ptarmigan would have either entirely
white tail or entirely black tail with very narrow white tips to the
feathers (again, scarcely visible). Any of them could have barred
uppertail coverts, which, as I wrote before, would cover a good part of the
tail. All grouse have "short and stout" beaks, and many of them have some
sort of naked skin around the eye, so these aren't field marks. Immatures
might look different from any illustrations in books.

I don't recall if you told us what habitat these birds were in. If they
were ptarmigan, they would have been way out in the open in the alpine
zone. If Spruce Grouse, they would have been associated with forest, even
if at its edge. I don't think Spruce Grouse ever go well away from forest,
but I don't know for sure about that.

I don't know what to say about your other grouse. Empirical evidence is
better than theory, but I'm still pretty skeptical about Ruffed Grouse in
high spruce forest. Habitat choice is extremely important in birds such as
grouse, that don't wander widely. Ruffed Grouse don't eat conifer needles
and don't occur in conifer forests, to my knowledge.

You sure are lucky to be able to spend all that time up there!

Dennis Paulson, Director phone 206-756-3798
Slater Museum of Natural History fax 206-756-3352
University of Puget Sound e-mail dpaulson at ups.edu
Tacoma, WA 98416