On Saturday, I suggested that we erect two perches on the lek for the Greater Prairie Chickens (GPCs). With Kevin’s help, we put one low driftwood perch in place, and a larger vertical perch. That morning, the birds wanted nothing to do with our perches. Even worse, both perches got in our way often. The low perch was so lovely that I made some images of it without a bird on it<\/em>.<\/strong> At the end of our session, we agreed to remove the vertical perch as it was quite obtrusive. Kevin said that he thought the birds would get up on the low perch “in a day or two.” So on Saturday night, I dreamed of the GPCs posing on the perch. <\/p>\n If you had asked me what were the chances of that happening the next day, I might have said, “I mean miracles can happen, so possibly.” <\/p>\n Early on Sunday morning, a few males were strutting quite close to the low perch, and once or twice they got up on it for a moment. As I was desperate for a shot, I tried a few at ISO 51,000. When the sun finally made an appearance, it turned out that we had gotten lucky; the low perch was perfectly placed between the very long shadows of my blind and Anita’s blind. Then my dreams were answered — several males got up on the handsome perch, and then several females took a liking to it. One hen posed there for about ten minutes; I shot her at 600, 840, and 1200mm. Some of the. males displayed, some of them jumped. By the time we quit at about 8:30am, I had created 8952 images, almost all with the a9 iii that Anita kindly loaned me after mine went on the fritz on Saturday. I kept 396 photos. 185 of those will be used to create an a9 iii “dancing Chicken” movie. Counting all of those as keepers left me with a success rate of 0.44%, less than 1\/2 of one percent. Images below.<\/p>\n Today is Monday 15 April. Our plan is to shoot in the wind in the morning, pack up the blinds, vacate our AirBnB and head north to Kevin’s place in Washburn, ND, forty miles north of Bismarck. Whatever you are doing, have fun and breathe deeply. <\/p>\n If you plan on purchasing a Sony a9 III Mirrorless Camera<\/a> (or anything else for that matter), please remember to use or write for either my Bedfords discount code or my B&H affiliate link. Folks who use one of my two affiliate links to purchase the a9 III will receive my .DAT settings (the complete camera set-up) along with a Buttons and Dials Guide. <\/p>\n Please remember to use the B&H links that are found on most blog pages and to use the BIRDSASART discount code at checkout when purchasing your new gear from Bedfords to get 3% back on your credit card and enjoy free second-day air FedEx. Please, also, consider joining a BAA IPT<\/a>. You will be amazed at how much you will learn! <\/p>\n If an item \u2014 a Delkin flash card, or a tripod head \u2014 for example, that is available from B&H and\/or Bedfords, is also available in the BAA Online Store, it would be great, and greatly appreciated, if you would opt to purchase from us. We will match any price. Please remember also to use my B&H affiliate links or to earn 3% cash back at Bedfords by using the BIRDSASART discount code at checkout for your major gear purchases. Doing either often earns you free guides and\/or discounts. And always earns my great appreciation.<\/p>\n Which of today’s four featured images do you think is the strongest. Those kind enough to leave a comment are asked to let us know why they made their choice.<\/p>\nYour Call?<\/h3>\n