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Early Sunday morning, April 23, Bonita Oliva, Woodston, and her overnight guest, Kim Perez, Hays, got up at 4:00 a.m., dressed warmly, as the outside temperature was 20 degrees, grabbed some hard-boiled eggs and coffee, and drove to Kirwin to meet Julie Ostmeyer. Julie is a partner in PhotoLogic, specializing in bringing photographers to a Prairie Chicken lek in their pasture in Phillips County. Her husband, Jeff Ostmeyer, had posted some incredible photographs of male Prairie Chickens on the Kansas Birding Facebook site with the location in Smith County. Bonita was sure the lek was just a short distance from where she lives and eventually contacted Julie through Facebook Messenger. More than 20 years ago, Bonita attended a meeting sponsored by Kansas Wildlife and Parks about Prairie Chickens. Then for several mornings, she got up very early, drove country roads in the area where she lived, and was super excited to find a couple of leks. Before the arrival in the spring of Redwing Blackbirds, which greet the dawn with raucous song, Bonita could distinguish the unique sounds made by the male Prairie Chickens in a lek that sounds something like the sound made by blowing over the top of a glass pop bottle. These sounds can carry a mile, especially on a perfectly calm morning. The sound is referred to as 'booming,' and leks have been referred to as 'booming grounds.' The movement of several deer caught Bonita's eye when she found her first lek. Looking through binoculars at the deer, she noticed small dots jumping on the top of a hill and realized she was looking at Prairie Chickens males vying for the attention of the female onlookers. Bonita has never returned to the site early in the morning to see if the lek still exits, but she has been inspired to look again.
