Interrupted Dance (Greater Prairie Chicken)

It's getting later in the mating season when a male greater prairie chicken vists a lek in the Kansas Flint Hills, hoping to find a female to impress. He starts his drumming and dance and a female arrives. Suddenly his dance is interrupted by another male competing for the rights. Who will win?

I thank Dave Rintoul for permission to use his great photos of these birds as reference tools in this painting. Though I have witnessed this annual display near my home in years past, I never got any photos.  I wanted to do a painting of this scene for a Flint Hills themed show in the Fall of 2013 Strecker Nelson Gallery in Manhattan. So I thank Dave for helping me accomplish this. If you want to see more of his photos of Greater Prairie Chickens, and the photo inspirations, you can find them at his link: http://www.ksbirds.org/gallery/gpc_2007/ .