Since 1998 The Great Bustard Group have helped reintroduce it into England on Salisbury Plain, a British Army training area.

The genus name Otis was introduced in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae;[5] it came from the Greek name ὠτίς ōtis[6] used for this species[7] taken from Natural History by Pliny the Elder published around 77 AD which briefly mentions a bird like it, it was also given the name ωτιδος ōtidos and the Latin aves tardas[a] mentioned by the Pierre Belon in 1555 and Ulisse Aldrovandi in 1600.

[9][10] The specific epithet tarda is Latin for "slow" and "deliberate",[11] which is apt to describe the typical walking style of the species.

[12] The Latin phrase avis tarda "slow bird" is the origin of the word bustard, via Old French bistarda.

Furthermore, male swans of the two largest species (trumpeter and mute) may attain a similar average mass depending on season and region.

[18] In terms of weight ranges reported, the great Indian bustard (Ardeotis nigriceps) also only lags slightly behind these species.

[19][20][15] The great bustard is also arguably the most sexual dimorphic extant bird species, in terms of the size difference between males and females.

[23] Going on mass, the only known bird with a higher dimorphism is the green peafowl (Pavo muticus) as the males are apparently near four times as heavy as females.

His breast and lower neck sides are chestnut and there is a golden wash to the back and the extent of these bright colours tending to increase as the male ages.

In the breeding season, the male has long white neck bristles, which measure up to 12–15 cm (4.7–5.9 in) in length, continually growing from the third to the sixth year of life.

The breast and neck of the female are buff, with brown and pale colouration over the rest of the plumage rendering it well camouflaged in open habitats.

The breeding range of the great bustard currently stretches from Portugal to Manchuria, though previously the species bred even further east in Russian Primorsky Krai.

[citation needed] Some individuals in Iberian populations make short seasonal movements of 5–200 km (3.1–124.3 mi), particularly males which appear to move in response to higher summer temperatures.

[29][30] Populations breeding along the Volga in Russia migrate around 1,000 km (620 mi) to spend the winter season in Crimea and Kherson Oblast.

[32] Great bustards often gather in larger numbers at pre-migratory sites in order to move collectively to winter grounds.

In the Iberian Peninsula, migrating great bustards seem to choose different periods for movements based on sex.

[39] The displaying males, who may walk around for several minutes at a time with feathers flared and head buried waiting for hens to arrive, have been described as a "foam-bath" because of their appearance.

The nests, which are shallow scrapes made by the female on dry, soft slopes and plains, are usually situated close to the prior lek location.

Nesting sites are typically in dense grassy vegetation about 15 to 35 cm (5.9 to 13.8 in), likely for protection against predation, with extensive exposure to sunlight.

If threatened, the young stand still, using their downy plumage, mainly sepia in colour with paler buffy streaks, as camouflage.

[41] Other favoured plant life in the diet can include legumes, crucifers, common dandelion and grapes and the dry seeds of wheat and barley.

[3] Among animal prey, insects are generally eaten and are the main food for young bustards in their first summer, though they then switch to the seasonal herbivorous preferences of adults by winter.

[3][42] Great bustards sometimes eat toxic blister beetles of the genus Meloe to self-medicate, increasing sexual arousal of males.

Predators of eggs and hatchlings include raptors, corvids, hedgehogs, foxes, weasels, badgers, martens, rats and wild boars (Sus scrofa).

[50] Chicks grow very quickly, by 6 months being nearly two-thirds of their adult size, and are predated by foxes, lynxes, gray wolves (Canis lupus), dogs, jackals and eagles.

A sizeable population also exists in Hungary (1,100–1,300 birds) where the Eastern European steppe zone ends, near Dévaványa town and also in the Hortobágy National Park, Nagykunság and Nagy-Sárrét regions.

Agroenvironment schemes as unirrigated legumes fostered a population increase of great bustards in Castilla y Leon, central Spain.

Mechanisation, chemical fertilizers and pesticides, fire and predation by dogs are serious threats for chicks and juveniles, and hunting of adults contributes to high mortality in some of their range countries.

[63] As early as 1797, the naturalist and wood engraver Thomas Bewick commented in his A History of British Birds that "Both this [the little bustard] and the Great Bustard are excellent eating, and would well repay the trouble of domestication; indeed, it seems surprising, that we should suffer these fine birds to be in danger of total extinction, although, if properly cultivated, they might afford as excellent a repast as our own domestic poultry, or even as the Turkey, for which we are indebted to distant countries.

The Hungarian authorities are seeking to preserve the long-term future of the population by active protection measures; the area affected by the special ecological treatment had grown to 15 km2 (5.8 sq mi) by the summer of 2006.