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2004 marks best year yet for Arizona's endangered ferrets Watchable Wildlife News December 27, 2004
"This year is turning out to be our best year so far," says Steve Goodman, an Arizona Game and Fish Department biologist who works on the ferret reintroduction project, "and we are still doing surveys to count more ferrets." Biologists thought the black-footed ferret was extinct in the late 1970s, but about 120 of the animals were found in the mid-1980s in Wyoming. In 1985, after two disease outbreaks had killed most of the remaining ferrets, the last 18 were captured to start a captive breeding program. Now their offspring live at eight reintroduction sites in the United States and Mexico, including one in the Aubrey Valley in northwest Arizona. In that valley outside Seligman, ferrets are periodically released into the wild with hopes they will thrive. "We're seeing more and more signs of success," says Goodman. "This year, we continue to see evidence that ferrets are reproducing in the wild, and we're finding evidence that ferrets are surviving longer in the wild." Every year, biologists take high-powered spotlights out at night around the release site in the Aubrey Valley. They do a sample count of ferrets over several weeks in the fall. The team is still doing its survey for this year, but already, the numbers are equal to what they were last year. Biologists and volunteers counted two dozen ferrets, including 14 that were clearly born in the wild since they didn't have the electronic markers that scientists implant to identify individual animals. In addition to being a release site, the Aubrey Valley also contains a preconditioning and breeding facility. Captive-born ferrets are kept in outdoor pens to precondition, or get them used to, new surroundings over the winter. Then, they are bred in the spring before they're released. Biologists believe the recent success of the program is related to these spring releases, which began in 2001. "We believe we're now seeing stable and possibly even increasing numbers of ferrets in the wild," says Goodman, "although we're still devising better methods to estimate the population. One black-footed ferret can give birth to three to five kits each year." Black-footed ferrets are related to weasels. They can grow to be up to two feet long and can weigh up to 2 1/2 pounds. Their main source of food is the prairie dog. One reason for the ferret's low numbers is that the government killed thousands of prairie dogs during the 1900s because they were considered pests. Before reintroduction, the last black-footed ferret found in Arizona was in an area between Williams and Flagstaff in 1931. The black-footed ferret reintroduction is a joint effort of the Arizona Game and Fish Department, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, The Phoenix Zoo, Navajo Nation, Arizona State Land Department, Hualapai Nation, and the Cholla Cattle Company. Note: The Arizona Game and Fish Department is looking for volunteers to help with future ferret surveys. The next one will be scheduled for March or April. If you are interested in helping with these nighttime spotlight surveys, please call the field crew for the ferret project at (928) 422-0155. |
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