Prairie Dogs Face Challenges Due to Warming Climate – Yale Climate Connections

Transcript:

In the Great Plains, black-tailed prairie dogs scamper in the grass and dig massive burrows where they live together in colonies.

Lindsey Sterling Krank of the Humane Society of the United States says prairie dogs are cute – and important to the ecosystem.

Many other species depend on them as prey or even live in their burrows.

Sterling Krank: “You’ve got eagles, you’ve got burrowing owls, black-footed ferrets, even tiger salamanders.”

But prairie dogs are in trouble.

Much of their habitat has been lost to agriculture, and the southern part of their range is becoming too dry.

Sterling Krank and her colleagues recently analyzed where suitable prairie dog habitat is found today and how it will shift as the climate warms.

Sterling Krank: “Everything that was in the southern part of their range, Texas, Arizona, going into Mexico a little bit, it’s kind of lobbed off, and you’re really seeing almost Colorado become the central core part of their range and then shifting north.”

Her team used surveys to identify places within that range where people are more likely to support prairie dog conservation.

They then combined their data into an interactive map that wildlife agencies and others can use to prioritize their conservation efforts.

So black-tailed prairie dogs have a better chance of thriving even as the climate warms.

Reporting credit: Ethan Freedman / ChavoBart Digital Media