ALERT - WIND CAVE National Park

BELOW FIND A NOTICE LETTER FROM NPS and JOURNAL ARTICLE

Dear Friends of Wind Cave National Park:

This letter is to inform you that the Draft Black-tailed Prairie Dog Management Plan and Environmental Assessment for Wind Cave National Park is available for public review. A copy of this document has been placed at the Custer, Hot Springs, and Rapid City libraries and the Wind Cave National Park Visitor Center. The document is also available online at Draft. If you do not have internet access, please contact the park for an electronic or hard copy at 605-745-4600.

The National Park Service is proposing to revise the Wind Cave National Park Prairie Dog Management Plan (NPS 1982) with management strategies that are consistent with the latest resource objectives and policies of the National Park Service. The primary purposes of revising the management plan for the black-tailed prairie dog at Wind Cave National Park are: to propose and evaluate an approach for sustaining a long-term population of prairie dogs; to conserve natural processes and conditions; to identify tools to manage the black-tailed prairie dog population in the park; to manage park resources in accordance with the park's general management plan, resource management plan, and NPS Management Policies 2001; and to protect public health, safety, and welfare.

To meet environmental regulations, the park is considering four alternatives:

a no action alternative that is defined as a continuation of current management of black-tailed prairie dogs

(Alternative A); a high acreage target of 3,000-5,000 acres of prairie dogs

(Alternative B); a mid-range acreage target of 1,000-3,000 acres of prairie dogs

(Alternative C); and a low acreage target of 300-1,000 acres of prairie dogs

(Alternative D). The Preferred Alternative is Alternative C.

We welcome your input on the project and on our efforts to conserve natural processes and conditions. The public comment period closes on March 10. Comments will be accepted during this period and should be addressed to the Superintendent; Wind Cave National Park; 26611 US Highway 385; Hot Springs, SD 57747 or electronically at the National Park Service planning website Comments made electronically on website. There will be an informal open house at the Wind Cave National Park Visitor Center on Thursday, February 16, from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. to discuss the plan with park staff and to comment on the alternatives.

It is the practice of the National Park Service to make all comments, including names and home addresses of respondents, available for public review during regular business hours. If you wish us to withhold your name and/or address, you must state this prominently at the beginning of your comment. We will make all submissions from organizations or businesses, and from individuals identifying themselves as representatives or officials of organizations or business, available for public inspection in their entirety.

Linda Stoll, Superintendent

For Questions call:

Barbara Muenchau
Wildlife/Research
Wind Cave National Park
26611 US Highway 385
Hot Springs, SD 57747
(phone) 605-745-1150
(fax) 605-745-4207

ARTICLE IN JOURNAL

Wind Cave National Park could again poison prairie dogs

By Steve Miller, Journal Staff Writer

HOT SPRINGS — Wind Cave National Park is considering a new prairie dog management plan that would allow the prairie dog population to grow by about a third from current levels but would also allow park staff to poison prairie dogs to prevent them from spreading onto adjacent private land.

It would be the first poisoning of prairie dogs in the park since 1997, park officials said Friday.

Park staff are seeking public comment on an environmental assessment and a plan to manage the park’s black-tailed prairie dog population, which currently covers about 2,200 acres.

The environmental assessment is analyzing four alternatives:

- Continue existing management practices.

- Allow the prairie-dog population to expand to more than 5,000 acres.

- Reduce the prairie-dog population to between 300 and 1,000 acres.

- (Preferred alternative): Allow prairie dogs to cover 1,000 to 3,000 acres. Allowing them to expand naturally to 3,000 acres would be an increase of about 36 percent.

This alternative would also provide the park flexibility to work with adjacent landowners to deal with conflicts from encroaching prairie dogs. That flexibility could include the use of lethal controls, such as poisoning, according to Tom Farrell, chief of interpretation for the park.

The poisoning would have to be done on the park’s side of the boundaries with adjacent land, according to park biologist Dan Roddy. “Incidences of prairie dogs dispersing beyond park boundaries would be addressed on a case-by-case basis in support of a good-neighbor policy while still maintaining the prairie dog’s ecological role in the park,” Roddy said in a written release.

In an interview Friday, Roddy said that the state has a program to help private landowners control prairie dogs coming onto their property from nearby public land.

Farrell said the public comment period for the environmental assessment will run until March 10.

There will be an informal open house at the park visitor center from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 16, when the park staff will discuss the draft plan and receive written comments.

Farrell urges anyone interested to look at a copy of the environmental assessment on the web site

Comments may be submitted on that Web site, or mailed to:

Superintendent
Wind Cave National Park
26611 U.S. Highway 385
Hot Springs, SD 57747-9430

Printed copies of the plan are available at the visitor center and at public libraries in Hot Springs, Custer and Rapid City.

If the environmental assessment finds no significant impact on the environment, the plan could take effect as early as the end of April, Farrell said Friday.

But he said large-scale poisoning on park land likely wouldn’t occur until the ground is frozen next winter because of concerns about the impacts of all-terrain vehicles on archaeological sites in the park.

Poisoning was banned on all federal lands in 2000, when the federal government determined that the black-tailed prairie dog warranted protection as a threatened species. In August 2004, the Interior Department dropped the prairie dog as a candidate for protection under the Endangered Species Act, allowing for controls such as poisoning.