Despite their important role, populations of the five prairie dog species have declined by around 95 percent—with two listed under the Endangered Species Act—due to a variety of threats, including ...

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — The plague has been confirmed in prairie dogs in the Badlands National Park, Buffalo Gap National Grassland, and the greater Conata-Badlands ecosystem, according to ...

Oh mama! Critically endangered black-footed ferret babies have been spotted in Pueblo County and two babies were born to a ...

Once thriving with 123 individuals in 2012, the ferret population had fallen dramatically. The culprit was sylvatic plague, a bacterial disease that devastates both ferrets and their primary prey, ...

The bacterial disease also impacted the ferret's main prey, Gunnison's prairie dogs, which damaged the entire ecosystem for the animals, in part leading to a decline of more than 100 ferrets in ...

Even so, visitors to places where they are prevalent are often reminded not to touch the prairie dogs because they can bite or transfer certain diseases like the sylvatic plague. As their ...

Rodents — especially prairie dogs — are particularly vulnerable to the plague. Entire colonies have been wiped out, impacting the broader ecosystem. In 2009, the plague killed more than 80% of ...

“Now we’re targeting the fleas that transmit plague between the prairie dogs and ferrets ... We’re treating the prairie dogs with the same active ingredient that’s in dog and cat flea ...

Sylvatic plague also infects ferrets’ main prey — Gunnison’s prairie dogs. But while the ferrets are extremely susceptible even to low levels of plague, the prairie dogs were surviving year ...