Like the prairie? Thank a rancher!
By John Bradley
NDWF Executive Director
Any hunter who has walked the great plains and had a sage grouse flush at their feet, knows the thrill. Even the most seasoned hunter gets a rush of adrenaline as the birds explode from cover. I was fortunate enough to hunt sage grouse in Montana last fall, where there is a 30-day season. Even with the best hunting dogs (and my lab, Ida, is far from that), trying to find these birds is like searching for a needle in a haystack. Unfortunately, opportunities to hunt these birds are becoming rarer, with most states severely cutting back, if not eliminating the entire hunting season. And while there are many other upland game birds that are out there and still have long seasons, there are a number of non-game species that are facing the same peril as sage grouse. Those brown little “tweety birds” should serve as an early warning for the upland bird hunter of the great plains.
Nationwide, grassland songbirds are disappearing. According to the North American Breeding Bird Survey, the continent’s longest-running bird monitoring program, chestnut-collared longspur numbers have tumbled by 81 percent since the survey began keeping records in 1966. It also shows an 80 percent decline in Baird’s sparrow populations over that same period. While hunters may not have a huge interest in these little brown birds, upland birds - especially sage grouse and prairie chickens - have also been on a significant downward trend across the great plains. Even grassland species that were common not too long ago, like North Dakota’s state bird, the western meadowlark, show downward population trends. When driving across North Dakota, it’s clear to see what accounts for this troubling drop in grassland bird numbers - conversion of historic grassland into cropland.
