Major Prairie Dog Dieoff Had Consequences For Other Animals, Wildland

Cheese dogs along the Yellowstone River in Wyoming.

When an outbreak hit the Thunder Basin National Grassland in Wyoming in 2017, there was mass death. This is disastrous for burrowing rats. But for the researchers, it's an opportunity to conduct a "nature experiment" on the effects of the drop.

What happened next forms the basis of a study in the journal Ecological Applications. It traces not only the fate of prairie dogs, but also the fate of the country where they live as well as the many animals impacted by their death.

The researchers examined pre- and post-blade dog prevalence data and studied the region's vegetation and fauna; moose and moose; and 80 species of birds.

Before the outbreak, prairie dogs covered 10,000 acres (about 39 square miles) of prairie. Later they could only be found in areas smaller than 50 acres.

The researchers write that the number of prairie dog predators in the region has decreased significantly. The badgers are down to "near zero" and the numbers of eagles, foxes and bobcats have declined.

Another cause of changes in the wildlife in the area is the death of prairie dogs. Due to unusually high levels of rainfall in 2018, 13.3 inches of rain were recorded between May and July, compared to just 5.4 inches the previous year.

The prairie dog population usually eats large amounts of grass afterwards. But without the prairie dogs, the grass grows uncontrollably. As a result, the number of mountain birds living in low vegetation has fallen to almost zero. Other species such as burrowing owls and horned birds are also excluded. They have been replaced by songbirds which prefer tall grass. One such species, the lark, has more than tripled its size.

The researchers concluded that prairie dogs played an "important role" for plant and wildlife in their habitat and that the outbreak posed a "major conservation challenge" that could affect many species.

More research is needed to better predict these cycles, they wrote. Given the potential for animal disease and future climate extremes, collaboration between researchers, landowners and others is needed to protect other animals from similar cascades after a species declines.