How Prairie Dogs Cry for Rain: Reflections on Shelter, Rain, and Drought
If you kill off the prairie dogs, there will be no one to cry for rain.
Traditional Navajo warming
One former prairie dog town stretched 25,000 square miles with its burrows sheltering 400 million animals. When 20 th century industry encountered such prodigious lives, it exterminated 98 per cent of them. However, the rains disappeared along with the prairie dogs, as both Navajo and Hopi individuals observed, looking out over the startling barrenness of lands from which prairie dogs were gone. Permaculture creator Bill Mollison proposed this explanation: prairie dog tunnels join those of other earth borers to create alveoli on the lungs of the soil that discharge moisture when underground aquifers expand and contract with twice daily earth tides. Thus prairie dog burrows helped conduct water into the air from underground water sources, instigating cycles of rain.
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I'm fond of prairie dogs . But keep the biting ants away from me . I want to wall those ants as much as possible .
Population
Black-tailed prairie dogs once numbered in the hundreds of millions maybe even over a billion and were possibly the most abundant mammal in North America. But due to a variety of reasons, their numbers have decreased by over 95%. Today, they may number around 10-20 million.
Did You Know?
The largest recorded black-tailed prairie dog town was about 100 miles long, found in western Texas.
Habitat & Range
Black-tailed prairie dog colonies were once found across the Great Plains from southern Canada to northern Mexico. Their colonies probably once occupied 40-80 million acres within this 400-million-acre region, and were often tens of miles long. Today their small, scattered colonies occupy only 1-2 million acres. They were eradicated completely from Arizona, but were recently reintroduced to that state in one small area. Black-tailed prairie dogs survive in small numbers (relative to historic figures) in 11 U.S. states, 1 Mexican state and 1 Canadian province.
~LINK!~
One former prairie dog town stretched 25,000 square miles with its burrows sheltering 400 million animals.
That's incredible! Just seeing a portion of that must have been amazing!
:~)
I hear ya, though all creatures great and small...
Personally, I hate spiders.
The prairie dogs is extremely important to the plains area. They support many other species.
Conservation of prairie dogs is of great importance to the prairie ecosystem. These animals were largely exterminated by farmers who killed the prairie dogs because they worried their cattle would break legs by stepping in the burrows. In reality, however, there are no known cases of any cattle ever being injured by a prairie dog burrow. Hunting prairie dogs for sport and for pest-control has persisted right up to modern times. If such hunting continues, the populations will continue to drop disastrous consequences will ensue for the ecosystem of the Great Plains.
Prairie dogs are considered a keystone species for the prairies. This means that they are a species whose existence adds to a diversity of life. If this keystone species becomes extinct, it would mean the extinction of many other forms of life as well. Over 200 other species have been observed living on or near prairie dog colonies. These colonies contribute to the ecosystem by providing burrows for other animals such as burrowing owls, black-footed ferrets, and snakes; providing a food source for such species as badgers, black-footed ferrets, coyotes, and many birds of prey; and their burrowing churns the soil to enable the earth to better sustain plant life. Without prairie dogs present, many aspects of the prairie life would change or disappear.
photo M. Noonan
The prairie dog is one of the most important species in the American prairie. Its numbers used to be so great that Lewis and Clark on their journey up the Missouri River noted that the animal "appears in infinite numbers". Now due to the intrusion of man, this wonderful creature's populations have been dramatically reduced. We must save this animal not only because we are responsible for its demise, but also because western ecosystems depend on the prairie dog.
How 'bout armadillo's?
Amos the armadillo lives under our front deck.
Interesting, Larry. Thanks.
The conclusions are staggering.
If this theoryis true (it seems likely to me) than we are at least partlyresponsible for the drought hitting the western states. Not just the (over) usage of water resources that contribute to a lack, but to be directly affecting, causing insufficient rainfall anddrought.
What can modern science answer to such wisdom? Is it superstition? A lucky guess? Happenstance? No, it is none of those. The answer is that the indigenous human species in North America was so finely tuned to their surroundings, that they simply knew.
Larry...bet you don't hate spiders this much!
Dang!
Thankfully no, I'm not quite that bad lol!
Big planet.
Room for every creature, big and small.
My favorite: the double breasted thrill seeker.
Least favorite: Human intestinal parasites.
E.
When Anglos arrived in the Tucson area 150 years ago, the water table was at 50 ft. Today it is at 650 ft.
Great article, Larry!
Many years ago, in Wyoming, we rode our horses through a prairie dog village. Those in our immediate vicinity were down hiding in their holes, while those at the outskirts of the village were standing up, watching us. It was as if we had an invisible cloaking device of some sort! I think they're cute little critters. Why kill them all? Why kill them at all?
I just love information like this. How amazing that Indians noticed that prairie dogs burrowing affected the weather. If this all proves to be right, there might be a way to fix what human population destroyed. Over and over it has been seen that indigenous populations truly observed and understood the interrelationship of the fawn and flora that newcomers never even thought about. And if they did, they packaged it and you could find it sold by Beyer.
Those fawns can get away with anything . It's those big brown eyes ...