prairie chicken

noun

: a grouse (Tympanuchus cupido) chiefly of the tallgrass prairies of the central U.S. with the male having yellowish-orange neck sacs which are inflated during courtship displays

also : a closely related smaller grouse (T. pallidicinctus) having reddish neck sacs

Illustration of prairie chicken

Examples of prairie chicken in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

As winter begins to close, nature lovers head to the grasslands around Wray to see the courtship dance of the greater prairie chickens and hear their loud calls. —Mindy Sink, The Denver Post, 7 Feb. 2024

There may have been hats or fudge, but there wasn’t always, say, a patch with an image of the most enormous booming prairie chicken. —Paul Nicolaus, Smithsonian Magazine, 18 Jan. 2024

Lesser prairie chickens are a ground-nesting species – found in parts of Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas – that is listed under the Endangered Species Act. —Discover Magazine, 26 Dec. 2023

New Englanders watched the heath hen, an eastern prairie chicken, collapse to a single male who died in 1931, followed quickly by the extinction of the most colorful of all our birds, the Carolina parakeet. —TIME, 12 Dec. 2023

Word History

First Known Use

1832, in the meaning defined above

Kids Definition

prairie chicken

noun

: a grouse of the prairies of the central U.S. with the males having a patch of bare skin on either side of the neck which is inflated with air during courtship displays