Anna Kramer
October 20, 2013
Sarah Zielinski
Published October 17, 2013
https://www.sciencenews.org/blog/wild-things/eliminating-prairie-dogs-can-lead-desertification
Summary:
A research team has studied the comparison between three types of land in the northwestern part of the Mexican state of Chihuahua. They compared grasslands with prairie dogs, grasslands without prairie dogs, and scrublands that used to have prairie dogs but are now overtaken with mesquite. In each land the scientists documented five present ecosystems: groundwater recharge, soil erosion, soil productive potential, carbon storage and availability of forage. The grassland with prairie dogs clearly beat out the other two areas. By burrowing in the ground that prairie dogs provided the soil with aeration, making the soil less compact so water and nutrients can distribute and feed the organisms. This goes through the chain of the ecosystems allowing for biodiversity. Because the soil is as well prepared by the prairie dogs in the other ecosystems, it leads to eventual desertification. Many people don't realize how necessary the prairie dogs are, they just see them as pests but do not understand the resulting chain of consequences that would result by eliminating the species.
Connection:
This articles connects to our lesson in the first unit about ecosystems. We learned that an ecosystem is an area that includes all of the abiotic (nonliving) factors and biotic (living) factors of that area, in this article the ecosystem is the grassland. We also learned that a keystone species is a species whose niche (living arrangement including many different factors) affects many other species in an ecosystem. This articles talks about the importance of the prairie dog as a keystone species in the grasslands. The prairie dog's burrowing provides homes for many species like amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals. They are also prey for animals such as the endangered black-footed ferret. Their grazing helps keep grasslands open and devoid of trees and as I said before they help aerate the soil. So as we learned the elimination of a keystone species does, if the prairie dogs were to be eliminated a huge loss of biodiversity would fall soon after.
How would Prairie Dogs disappear from an ecosystem?
ReplyDeletePrairie dogs would disappear because of human interaction. The prairie dogs are seen as pesks to surrounding human populations, so measures such as hunting the prairie dogs or doing whatever is necessary to keep their numbers down could occur. What people with these ideas don't realize is that even though the prairie dogs seem like a nuisance, there would be a much bigger nuisance over time if the ecosystem withered because of the loss of prairie dogs.
DeleteIf another burrowing animal were added to the ecosystem with prairie dogs would the effect be the same, the soil be better or would the soil have too many holes and end up in worse shape than it started in?
ReplyDelete