Badlands National Park Day 16

October 14, 2014

Badlands National Park Day 16

Last night was incredible! Such an amazing experience to be up close with the black footed ferrets. I met up with the wildlife biologists at 9pm and we loaded up traps, reflectors, and other supplies, heading out for Roberts Prairie Dog town across the park in the Sage Creek area. There are two other towns in the park that have a ferret population, which were also being spotlighted. The purpose for all this is to monitor the population, get an idea of it's size, administer plague vaccines/boosters, and more. The way it is done is we drive across the (very large) prairie dog town, running a spotlight over the land in the distance searching for the distinctive green eye shine of these ferrets. They are tiny creatures, and even large animals are tough to pick out with the light unless you focus on eye shine. When you spot something that looks ferrety, you stop and pull out binoculars for a better look. Ferrets live inside abandoned prairie dog holes, and like to peek out. If what you saw is a ferret, you drive quick to get to the hole, hop out, grab a couple traps and a reflector, and approach slowly to check that the ferret is still in the same hole. They will usually keep peeking out, but as you get close they stay down, and you insert a trap into the hole. The traps are wrapped with covers with the end open so that it acts like an extension of the whole and when the ferret climbs up to peek out, he triggers the trap mechanism. After placing the main trap, you stick a reflector in the ground so that you can find the spot again later, grab GPS coordinates, and put a secondary trap in a nearby hole (this one is left closed and acts like a plug to encourage the ferret to come out the trap). Back in the truck, there is some paperwork to document location and other information, then you continue on, spotlighting the landscape, driving in patterns all around the prairie dog town. After a trap has been set for an hour, it needs to be checked. Often the ferret will be at the top and you can spot the eye shine from a distance. When you find a trapped ferret, you pull the trap, unwrap the cover, run a scanner over it to see if it has been microchipped before, and then transfer the animal into a tube for transport to the mobile lab. The ferrets ride in the truck to stay warm, and once there are a few collected, we all meet up and give the animals to one person who drives them halfway across the park to the mobile lab for processing. Here the ferret guru puts them under, checks for fleas, checks for ticks, takes samples of both, gives a plague vaccine or booster, gives a shot of penicillin to help with likely health issues, gives an injection of fluids for a health boost, checks age and gender, inserts a microchip if there isn't one, and paints some hair dye onto the side of the neck for easy identification in the field in case the same ferret is trapped again during this round of spotlighting. The ferret is then taken off the isoflourine, weighed, and placed into a small kennel for transport back to the field. we then drive the batch of ferrets back, use GPS to locate the hole they were trapped in, and release them back. By this time, there may be another batch of caught ferrets ready to transport to the lab. This continues until dawn, when everyone does one last check of all the traps, collects the ferrets and empty traps, and there is one last run to the lab. The last ferrets are returned to the field, and then we all head home, somewhere around 9am. Is it a most unique experience, moments of excitement and busyness, and hours of trying to stay alert and visually focused on green eye shine.

A few things about black footed ferrets. BFFs are one of the most endangered animals in North America. They were thought to be extinct until a small population was discovered in Wyoming in 1981. At one point the known living population was down to just 18 animals. After years of efforts with captive breeding and releasing animals into the wild, the population has been on the rise. Here at Badlands, a new blow was dealt in 2007/8 when the plague arrived. Affecting small mammals such as prairie dogs, which ferrets rely on as a food source, the population here plummeted from something around 330 animals to around 30. After this week's trapping efforts, the current population in the park is estimated at 30-40 individuals. Ferrets live underground in abandoned prairie dog holes, and feed primarily on prairie dogs. These small animals manage that by feeding at night when the prairie dogs are asleep. When you see the sizes of these two animals next to each other, it seems like quite an accomplishment on the part of the ferrets.

A favorite story from the night: when a couple of us were releasing the first few ferrets (we caught 5 all night), one of the little guys did not predictably run down into his hole. Instead, he came out of the kennel, looked around, and took off in the opposite direction. We followed him as he ran, a challenging thing in the middle of the night with just a headlamp. After a bit there was a little splash, and then a patterned splashy sound: he ran into the dam and swam all the way across! We could see him, but there was no chance for photographs. Everyone was astounded when we told them what happened, especially since it was a chilly 34 degrees out. Hoping he's okay.

I could say so much more about these fascinating animals. If you would like to read more or are interested in contributing to research and support efforts, visit this site: http://www.prairiewildlife.org/ This organization was started by Travis Livieri, a biologist who worked here at Badlands while studying the ferrets for his masters degree. Travis was here this week with his mobile lab to work with the population here in the park.

I made it back to park headquarters at about 10am, and had breakfast with a friend while planning a group hike to Harney Peak for tomorrow. I then slept much of the day, had dinner with friends, and then we sat around a fire for the evening, enjoying the calm air.