Talk:prairie chicken

What's a prairie hen?

 * Wikipedia redirects prairie hen to their article on prairie chicken, so is it the same thing &mdash; or perhaps only a female of the species?
 * Chambers 1908 defines it as "a gallinaceous North American bird; the sharp-tailed grouse" (is that one sense defined two ways, or two different birds?).
 * And then there are remarks like this, found on Google Books:


 * 2005, Federation of Alberta Naturalists, ‎Fish and Wildlife Historical Society, Fish, Fur & Feathers
 * Nuttall also used pinnated grouse and sharp-tailed grouse correctly, but unfortunately applied the common name of "prairie chicken" to both species. No wonder there was confusion with ruffed grouse and sharp-tailed grouse prior to Nuttall's book

Equinox ◑ 01:40, 15 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Presumably it's the better half of a or cock of the plains. It's not unusual for such a term to refer to more than one species. DCDuring (talk) 02:03, 15 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I wonder whether any species of subfamily Tetraoninae in the North America could be called a prairie chicken, not just Tympanuchus spp.. DCDuring (talk) 02:13, 15 September 2019 (UTC)
 * If you search on "male prairie hen" or "female prairie hen", you'll see that at least some people apply the name to both genders. As for the matter of other genera: most grouse are found in forests or in the mountains. Even the "sage" in the name of some species refers to a habitat in the Great Basin that wouldn't be considered "prairie", even if it is treeless and wide open. I doubt anything outside of Tympanuchus would be called prairie-anything because they're not prairie birds. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:04, 15 September 2019 (UTC)
 * So it seems. The sharp-tailed grouse used to be in a separate genus, but no more. The pinnated grouse referred to by the Albertans would seem to be a subspecies of Tympanuchus cupido. The vernacular names for the sage grouse, which has mating behavior like that of the prairie chicken, include two with cock in them. I have deepened the entries for Tympanuchus, Tympanuchus cupido (including sound!), and prairie chicken. DCDuring (talk) 03:20, 15 September 2019 (UTC)
 * I note that many of the translations of prairie chicken (See .) use words that are often used to refer to femals chicken-like birds. DCDuring (talk) 03:41, 15 September 2019 (UTC)