End of a Season

Our prairie dog colony is spending less and less time out of doors, and they are all looking rather portly!. Happily we have had only two casualties this year, sad for the two we lost and glad it was not a blood bath this year. We received a thank you from a neighbor for having our road be clear of PDs for the summer and as time goes on there are more and more stories of PD advocacy in our part of NM. I hope we can turn this interest into action and funds to remove the rest of the colony to safer ground.

For 2009
1. Assist Prairie Dog Pals in obtaining a new relocation site.
2. Complete funding this years project. ~800.00
3. Set up fund for upcoming year and removal dates, volunteers. etc. ~3000
4. Set date and obtain PDP's assistance in next years relocation project.

Thank you for all of your participation,
May our Bosque Farms Prairie Dogs have a restful hibernation.

The Good News

Usually by this time we have had multiple casualties on North Bosque Loop and to date we have only had one casualty. So we have met our first goal, to drop down the population enough to stop the Prairie Dogs from being pressured into the road in search for food and cover.
...... Now how do we get to the next goal, raise an additional 800.00 to complete our promise to Prairie Dog Pals and how to pay for another rescue before the PD capture season is over?

Any ideas?

KD

Short Update

Hello all,
Hope all is great in your world. Whew, almost the beginning of July and no casualties on North Loop as of yet. Whoppee!!! We sent some more funds to Prairie Dog Pals yesterday along with a copy of the news article. Hope we get a few more donations in so can complete paying them for promised funds. Looks like we still owe them around 811.16.
Have a great day.
K

We made the paper!

While I know we are still all getting caught up in our lives, after lending two consecutive weekends to the BF Prairie Dog Project, we had a delightful event today. Our project made the paper, (no photos within the Internet version), we have a delightful front page photo and article in the Saturday edition of the Valencia County News Bulletin. Here is the link: http://www.news-bulletin.com/news/81088-06-21-08.html

A big thank you to all who attended last Sunday. It was a long 10 hour , hot day for all of us. Thank you again to Prairie Dog Pals for a hard days work and for all of the continued relocation work.

A few highlights of the day, talking to many locals who are clear PD advocates and talking to locals who are not PD advocates and have valuable experience with trying to control populations. (It is always good to hear all sides to an issue) 2. Getting the remaining PDs captured out of the field next to North Bosque Loop RD. 3.Having kids join us for part of the day. 4.Gaining a real love for ice. 5. Sharing the day with friends doing a task that provides a community service. 6. Hearing the PDs in the field next to us chattering at us and telling them, "We are coming for you." 7. Knowing that even though we did not get them all, some of them are being moved to a better home.

Karen

Tomorrow

Tomorrow will be our second day of Prairie Dog Capture in Bosque Farms. It will be an early day for those of us working to capture as many PDs as we can. And it is going to be a hot one!!!!! We will have a canopy set up tomorrow with an information table and a place for volunteers and the captured PDs to gain some relief from the sun.
Happy Father's Day

Upcoming Prairie Dog Capture Day

Wow, it was hard to imagine how much we would miss the prairie dogs that were in the field close to North Bosque Loop. The daily experience of watching them feed, seeing the sentries watching over the colony, the yearly baby PD watch, is one that contributed to us all. Would be great to have a Prairie Dog Park in Valencia County as a source of education, conservation support and viewing enjoyment.
The Prairie Dogs that where captured last weekend are off to a sustainable home, one with healthy native grasses and no cars.
June 15th is the date of our last PD capture in this area. We could still use a few volunteers. If you are interested please e-mail me at bfprairiedogs@aol.com. Thanks so much for your support.

One little, Two Little, Three Little Prairie Dogs

I asked David what to title the post today. He said it has to have something about the beach, meaning the sand and sun, no water in site, except for the soapy water going down the PD holes.
We had a successful day today. Captured many Prairie Dogs and they are off to be staged for a week and then to their new home. One with grass and no cars!!! A special thanks to Prairie Dog Pals, Yvonne and Eddie, Lee, David, and to John who took wonderful photos today.

Next Sunday we will be doing an additional PD pick up.

Dominos Delivers

Today was a long day as we prepared for our first PD pick up. We fed all the dogs, some this morning some this afternoon. We were joking about the PDs in their holes tonight as a carrot came tumbling in, kicking back Whahoo!!! Dominos delivers!

Tomorrow at 7am we will be setting up silt fence so as we start to remove PDs the pups do not scatter and get in the road. Then meet at our house at 8:45 am for training and away we go.

Bought 100 pds of sunflower seeds today to go with the PDs tomorrow to help with feed for the 7 to 10 days they will be held before release.

Had two donations today one from Peg, $$ for Sunflower seeds and a 25 # bag of sunflower seeds was donated by the Western Mercantile in Los Lunas.

Wish us luck with our captures tomorrow.

Prairie Dog Purrs

Today I visited the Prairie Dog Pals facility and had a long chat with Yvonne and Eddie. We coordinated logistics and have set two dates for PD pick up. One will be this coming Sunday and then another in a week.

I met many Prairie Dogs today and was impressed with PDPs facility and the depth of their care. While I was there I had the opportunity to hold a prairie dog, one that cannot be released because of injuries. He was tame and handle able. Prairie Dogs in the wild are not meant to be handled.

While I was holding him he started to gently shake. I told Yvonne I thought he was scared, she said no he is purring. Amazing Prairie Dog Purrs!

June 5, 2009

Today, thanks to Prairie Dog Pals, the Bosque Farms Dogs will have a new and safe home to be relocated to.
Our biggest need currently is donations. We have raised 664.41 to date!!! 100% of the funds we raise will go into this project.
We have finally set up a donation link that will accept all credit cards and Paypal.This is a key and vital component to our project. We have a goal of raising $7,000 to move all the PDs in our neighborhood to safe ground, every $35.00 we raise moves a prairie dog to safe ground.

A big thank you to Lee for being our landowner liaison in obtaining permission for this move. And thank you to Mr Trujillo and Mr Tabet for permission, we appreciate their generosity. And thank you to Prairie Dog Pals for their continued partnership.

I will get pictures up this week of the Bosque Farms Prairie Dogs and the conditions they are currently living in.

Day Two of the Bosque Farms Prairie Dog Relocation Project

Today was a good day for the Prairie Dogs of Bosque Farms. I attended a Civitan meeting tonight and requested a donation and volunteers. This is a great group of people who consistantley give their time and money to worthwhile causes. They sponsored the move of three PDs and Michelle donated $50.00 for the move of one more and for food. They have lots of ideas to fundraisers and different groups that they thought might assit us in this project.
I so appreciate this.

May 29, 2008

Good Morning,
This is the first day of our project. I am excited to finally be getting the ball rolling on this project. This is not just my pursuit, there are other people living in my neightborhood who have been leaders in fostering this project and Prairie Dog Pals has been an long term advocate for the Gunnison Prairie Dogs in NM and we are appreciative to have their partnership.