Prairie Dog Day is Soon! February 2nd!

The long weekend is over and Prairie Dog Day is coming soon!  Most people know February second as groundhog day, but here in the west part of America there are no groundhogs! It has been re-named Prairie Dog Day!

For the readers in other countries who do not know of either holiday: Groundhog day is a day where people gather at the base of a hill to watch a famous groundhog crawl up out of his hole. If the groundhog sees his shadow he will get scared and run back into his hole signaling that winter will continue for a little longer. If he does not see his shadow he will not be scared into his hole and winter will end. 

Unlike its cousin the groundhog, prairie dogs do not hibernate and therefore we can not do the whole prairie dog and shadow thing, but lots of schools and environmental organizations are celebrating prairie dog day by teaching children the importance of prairie dogs and hosting parties to celebrate the little critters!

The plains conversation center and prairie dog coalition are doing their parts by working together and educating visitors on february second about prairie dogs and having a bunch of fun activities based on the tiny people.

Killing Puppies

prairie dog: way smaller than bison

Yesterday I was doing some research on prairie dogs.
As I was lazily scrolling down on Google, something caught my eye: some place was selling prairie dogs as pets!
Being the curious eleven year old girl I am, I checked out the website. It had a lot of information on how to take care of prairie dogs and keep them. It said that, because of their social lives in the wild, they make amazing pets that are like overly bonding puppies that never grow up.  The good thing is that they can fit in your pocket! They are so social that they will bond with other animals, even ones five times the size of them! They can even bond with other prairie dogs and their owner. They will jump on a bison the size of a giant compared to them to save their owner. They are just like little kittens or puppies.

So I ask the people who want to exterminate prairie dogs: would you be as enthusiastic about sending a bunch of people with tanks of poison on their backs to kill a whole town inhabited by puppies? Not stray puppies covered in dirt that attack every person who walks by. Puppies that have only harmed six people in the last 57 years? Puppies that eat grass and not other animals? And even if you did, many many dog lovers would stop you before you could pick up the phone.  Many prairie dog lovers are trying to stop you from killing the "puppies" (prairie dogs), but they are not being listened to.

So please please just try and spend a few hours and call up the prairie dog coalition or someone like that and let them tell you how to solve your problems with the prairie dogs or show you that the problems are just in your head.
---Cymbre Arwen Smith

Winter Break is Over, Prairie Dog Blog Had a Sucess

Winter break is over and the original goal of the prairie dog blog has been accomplished, we have convinced the city to not exterminate but relocate the remaining prairie dogs in the Bear Creek Greenbelt. Now that that park is saved it is time to save the city! The next thing that I will do to help the prairie dogs is try to get the city to make a law (or is a law in a city not called a law?) that prairie dogs can not be exterminated, or even just that before any exterminations there must be a period of public comment. Because if you save a city, a state is next, then a country. (Hopefully!) if anyone knows either a lawyer that loves prairie dogs and will help me make a petition or where I can get a template for a petition with all the annoying legal stuff already written on it please do not hesitate to put a link to the template or the lawyer's email address in the comments below or send it to my email. Thanks!
---Arwen/Cymbre