Boulder County Parks and Open Space hosted its annual prairie canine administration assembly Thursday in Longmont as the area people gathered to convey their considerations and questions on prairie dog removal and conservation efforts on close by agricultural lands.
Agricultural Resource Specialist Cassandra Schnarr addressed the criticism the workplace had been receiving not too long ago about using prairie canine elimination methods in Habitat Conservation Areas:
“So we had lots of calls and comments saying that we were not following the policy on HCA areas,” mentioned Schnarr. “Our policy is really long and hard to wade through so maybe you missed it but it does say that non-lethal and lethal control can be used on HCAs when it’s deemed necessary, so we do follow our policy.”
The presentation outlined the variations between Habitat Conservation Areas and Multiple Objective Areas. HCAs are designated areas the place prairie dogs exist in pure settings with pure disturbance regimes, with out being disrupted by exterior forces. MOAs are focused agricultural lands the place the vast majority of prairie canine elimination is going on.
Schnarr outlined one of many non-lethal types of elimination, prairie canine barrier fencing:
“It’s chicken wire and flops over a foot or two at the top so that prairie dogs can’t scale up or get through… so they can’t enter through properties where we don’t want them. Obviously, they can still do a massive tunneling job if they need to plan a great escape,” Schnarr mentioned.
This yr Boulder County employees and volunteers put in 12,418 ft of fencing on 10 completely different properties double the quantity of prairie do,g fencing in comparison with final yr, Schnarr acknowledged. She added that Boulder County has utilized deadly management on 19,633 burrows on 32 properties and handled 328 acres in Boulder County.
After the presentation was completed, Boulder County opened up the ground for any attendee’s questions. When apprehensive group members requested what sort of deadly management was getting used, Schnarr answered.
“We do lethal control of properties on agricultural properties all over the county … we use carbon monoxide”, mentioned Schnarr.
Senior Wildlife Biologist Mac Kobza added to Schnarr’s remark:
“We looked at veterinarian ethics and standards … wildlife people don’t like to kill animals but this method seemed to be a more humane approach to control prairie dogs,” Kobza mentioned.
A person within the assembly requested what number of prairie dogs have been killed yearly and if the county had thought-about any coexistence methods. Initially, Schnarr answered by mentioning euthanasia efforts on non-public agricultural properties however her response was reduce brief by the person asking additional questions.
“I don’t think we need to demonize farmers because that doesn’t help the conversation,” Schnarr mentioned.
After group members requested a few follow-up questions, the assembly ended an hour early. Attendees have been inspired to method Schnarr and Kobza individually if that they had additional questions.
For extra details about prairie canine administration and elimination in Boulder County, go to www.boco.org/PrairieDogs. Reach out to Resource Specialist Amy Schwartz with questions or considerations at 303-829-5497 or [email protected].
