The Schaumburg Boomers (independent; Frontier League) unveiled mascot Coop, a male prairie chicken with his own Booming Dance — a mating strut to pitch the woo toward the lady chickens.
“We’re so happy to have Coop as part of our family and as the official face of the Boomers,” Boomers President/GM Andy Viano said. “It’s exciting to see Coop officially spread his wings for the first time and I look forward to seeing him all over Chicagoland in the next few months and at every Boomers game starting May 25.”
Coop is a male Greater Prairie Chicken, which can be found, as their name suggests, on the prairies throughout the Midwest. Prevalent in Schaumburg within the last 100 years, prairie chickens are now listed as “threatened” on the Illinois Endangered Species Protection Board. Today, prairie chickens like Coop are generally found in Missouri, Iowa, Illinois and the Dakotas when once there was approximately 5-12 million in Illinois alone during the Abraham Lincoln era.
The male Greater Prairie Chicken is renowned for furiously defending its booming grounds and a special booming dance during mating season. The “Booming Dance” takes place every morning and afternoon from February-April as the males compete for prime real estate in the middle of the Booming Grounds. Booming has a social function in the prairie chicken society as the Booming Grounds are the place to be seen and heard as the males try to assert their dominance over one another. You can see the world’s largest statue of a booming prairie chicken here: it can be found in Rothsay, Minnesota, the hometown of former Twins and Dodgers pitcher Dave Goltz.
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