The Spruce Grouse is a chunky, dark grouse of the northern conifer forest, and it is famous for one striking trait: an almost complete lack of fear of people. Rather than flushing explosively like a Ruffed Grouse, a Spruce Grouse will often sit tight on a branch or the ground and simply watch an approaching human, a trusting habit that earned it the old, unflattering name "fool hen." The male is handsome and dark, slate-gray with a black throat and breast and bright red combs over the eyes; the female is a cryptic mottled rusty-brown.
Spruce Grouse are conifer specialists, and in winter they live almost entirely on the needles of spruce, fir, and jack pine, digesting this tough, resinous fare with the help of a large, muscular gizzard and gut. They inhabit dense conifer forests and bogs, and in Michigan they are year-round residents at the southern edge of their range in the Upper Peninsula and, historically, the northern Lower Peninsula. In spring the male performs a display flight, clapping his wings, and drums softly to attract females among the shadowed spruces.
Feeds heavily on conifer needles — especially spruce, fir, and jack pine — through the winter, digesting the tough, resinous foliage with a large gizzard, and adds buds, berries, and insects in the warmer months. Chicks eat mostly insects, while adults become highly specialized needle-eaters in the cold season.
The Spruce Grouse often shows little fear of people, sitting tight and watching rather than flushing. This tameness made it easy to approach and hunt, earning it the old nickname "fool hen."
Almost entirely conifer needles — spruce, fir, and jack pine — which it digests with a large, muscular gizzard. This diet of tough, resinous foliage lets it survive winter in the conifer forest.
As a year-round resident of dense spruce, fir, and jack pine forests and conifer bogs, mainly in the Upper Peninsula at the southern edge of its range. It is scarcer and more local than the widespread Ruffed Grouse.
Poults or chicks. They hatch fully downy, leave the nest within a day, and can flutter into low branches at about a week old — long before they can properly fly. Juveniles look like the barred brown female.
A covey, though Spruce Grouse are usually met as singles or as a hen with her brood along a northern two-track rather than in gathered flocks.
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