Prairie Dogs: A Modern Day Plague :: Free Argumentative Essays

Prairie Dogs ? A Modern Day PlagueAlmost Every Morning on the plains of eastColorado, rancher knowingness Holmes squints through ariflescope and sights in on a fat, little prairie dog.At the blink of an eye, he pulls the trigger and ahollow-tipped slug erupts from the barrel. Two coke yards later, the slug explodes in the prairiedog scattering its ravaged flesh across the plains. Some people say that this is a horrible act, but forranchers like Ken Holmes, its away to save hisgrazing fields. The prairie dog is a controversial animal because manypeople perceive them to be a prolific nuisance.Shooting and poisoning has reduced an extremely largepopulation, which once covered most of the westernU.S. and northern Mexico. In Texas, the historicpopulation at the turn of the century in 1900 wasestimated to be approximately 5.5 billion animals.Today, numbers of prairie dogs in Texas are estimatedat only 300,000 (cdri). Maybe if these numbers keepdecreasing at such an terrible rate, the pr airie dogproblem may actually come to an end. So no local,state, or federal government should try to bring thesenumbers up. This animal tablet gigantic burrows, and makes extensivetunnels underneath the Earths surface (bitterroot). This natural act the prairie dog makes kills grass anddestroys fields taking away feed for cattle and cropsfor food. Many scientists consider that this act is anatural fertilizer, giving nutrients back to the soil(National Geographic p.116). If this natural act is afertilizer, then why are many ranchers and farmersconfront with a loss of money. Usually due to the factthat these burrows take up a wide range of theyrefields making it difficult to grow and get ahead anythingfor a profit. Also, if this fertilizing act actuallyfertilizes the land, then why is it that they seem todestroy a field rather than help it? Rather than try to shoot them or poison them, somehave tried to set aside protected areas, and relocatethe prairie dogs. In Boulder, Colorado, ap proximately20,000 feet of visual barrier was installed alongboundaries of these protected areas. The equal of thatwas $23,000, but that figure represents only enough tocover about 7.5% of the perimeter surrounding thearea. It would require an additional $242,350 tofinish that barrier. Instead of this expensivebarrier, relocating them was the second option. Inorder to do this, it would cost upwards of $100,000just to move them somewhere else (ci boulder). Thatis a lot of money to be throwing around on an animalthat not many people like. If people were going to