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Usually, we start at about four o'clock in the morning.

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After the cover of darkness, wildlife biologist Nancy Crystal drives north from her home base

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in Spooner to the Nama Kagan Barren's wildlife area.

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We want to be on site at least 45 minutes before sunlight this morning.

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Oh my gosh, it was barely in time.

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Barely a heartbeat before the landscape begins a wild awakening.

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Long before she sees them in the moonlight, she can hear subtle tremors on the prairie.

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It's a beautiful day.

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Sharped out grouse are pretty rare species in Wisconsin.

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Nancy bears witness to an ancient rhythm as old as the natural world.

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It's an intricate courtship dance from one of our state's most unique birds.

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All the guys pipe each other up and we start dancing around and puffing out their nice

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purple sack.

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They put their pointy white tail up in the air and then they stick out their nice orange

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eyebrow.

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And their goal is to do the best dance.

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I love the dance, so to have a bird that really has some good steps and can bring some

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liveliness to the grounds, I think that that is pretty cool.

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The male grouse are the only dancers and they work the prairie floor to attract females.

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The females seem to act like, ah, no big deal.

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I'm not even looking at you on it.

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Of course they're watching and they're paying attention.

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The champions of the grassland hold their dancing duel in a prairie location called

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a lek.

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The arts had 22 males on it and 60 males that came this morning, but of all those males

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you just get one lucky guy and that one lucky guy is the only one that is going to be sharing

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its genes out in the world.

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Each spring in the pre-dawn chill, Nancy and her team do a survey of sharp-tailed grouse.

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The reason we do it is to really keep track of what we have for a population of what is

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really a rare species.

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She counts the birds and looks for expansion of traditional mating grounds.

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So the sharp-tailed grouse I think are really cool.

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The females come and visit, they fly up into the trees, they run along the edge, so it's

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really tough to be counting the females.

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For more than 26 years, Nancy has brought her passion for wildlife to the Department

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of Natural Resources, her job to manage this ecosystem, ensuring all native species can

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thrive and survive in this sanctuary.

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I come to work and I know that I have habitat that needs to be maintained and I have species

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that need to be managed.

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So for me a great day is when I'm able to go out and see the benefits of all the work

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that we do to manage the property and have it for the public to come and view the sharp

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tails.

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That is a really good day.

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Nancy's workplace is a wildlife area filled with the desolate beauty that you will not

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find anywhere else on the planet.

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It is true that this is the only place in the world that you can go and find pine oak

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barrens in these Northwest sands.

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It also is a globally rare habitat type and it's got such a diversity of grasses and

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flowers and shrubs.

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Nancy has a deep connection to this untamed wilderness and the creatures that inhabit

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it.

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Never have seen a show like this when I first moved.

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They might be thinking about leaving.

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Pretty cool aren't they?

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Get satisfaction out of my job.

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When I go home to my family I can go home happy but I had a good day and just feel as

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though I'm making a difference even if it's a small little thing like that just makes

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me feel good all the time.

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Reclaiming this unusual landscape is a job both rich in research and rewards and that

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is Nancy's core motivation.

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When they're dancing and everything they end up just kind of losing feathers here and

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there and then we can use that for genetics.

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If you're going to do something in life every day you should be something that's fun and

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enjoyable.

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It's a cool looking one.

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Those kinds of things are pretty great.