White-tailed Ptarmigan

by Barry Kent MacKay

Buy the Original Painting

Price

$950

Dimensions

16.000 x 20.000 x 0.250 inches

Title

White-tailed Ptarmigan

Artist

Barry Kent MacKay

Medium

Painting - Acrylic On Compressed Hardboard

Description

The White-tailed Ptarmigan is the smallest species of grouse. Of the three species of ptarmigan, it is the only one endemic to North America, found only in the western mountains of the U.S. and Canada, mostly in the alpine zone, and the only bird species to normally exclusively inhabit that ecological region year-round. It is non-migratory. Ptarmigan are noted for having cryptic plumage, all mottled in shades of brown, grey, rust, black and white in summer, to camouflage them against tundra and other ground habitat, and white in winter, making them hard to see in snow. The generic name, “Lagopus”, derives from Ancient Greek name, “lagos” (λαγως), meaning hare, plus “pous” (πους), meaning foot, a reference to the feet being fully feathered down to the toe-tips, thus resembling the furry foot of a hare (rabbit). The species name, leucura, comes from the Latinization of the Greek word, leukos, which means white, and oura, for tail. The “p” in ptarmigan is silent. The word itself derives from the 16th century Scottish-Gaelic word, tàrmachan. They eat vegetation, including leaves, flowers, berries, seeds, pine needles and lichen, having special digestive ability to digest a winter diet high in cellulose. Chicks eat small insects. They nest in shallow impressions amid rocks and vegetation, out of the wind. The chicks are “precocial”, meaning active once they have hatched and dried, but stay close to their mother, who calls to them if separated. I’ve shown a pair, male in front, with five of their chicks. They can have as many as eight. The painting is approximately life-size, in acrylics on compressed hardboard, 20” by 16”. $950.00 including frame.

Uploaded

March 28th, 2021

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