Wildlife Department Offers Tool for Developers to Protect Critical Prairie Chicken Habitat

The Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation today released its new tool designed to protect and conserve imperiled lesser prairie chickens affected by land development in western Oklahoma.

″The tool, known as the Oklahoma Lesser Prairie Chicken Spatial Planning Tool, is a habitat-based model that quantifies the value of every acre within lesser prairie chicken range,″ said Russ Horton, research supervisor for the Wildlife Department. ″This tool should prove invaluable to responsible developers and planners as they search for sites where development would least impact Oklahoma′s dwindling population of lesser prairie chickens.″

The lesser prairie chicken is identified as a species of greatest conservation need in Oklahoma and is a candidate for federal listing as threatened, range-wide. The sand shinnery and sand sagebrush native rangelands of northwest Oklahoma are crucial for survival of this species. The same area also provides some of Oklahoma′s most abundant sources of energy including wind, oil and natural gas. Efforts to harvest this energy are projected to rapidly intensify over the next few years.

″Oklahoma′s wind industry will provide a clean source of domestically produced energy that will contribute to our state′s future economic growth,″ noted Secretary of Energy Robert Wegener. ″It is critical for this industry and others impacting the prairies of western Oklahoma to utilize tools such as this.″

Secretary of the Environment J.D. Strong added, ″If the wind industry is to remain ′green,′ and others want to demonstrate their concern for our environment, then necessary steps such as this must be taken to avoid endangering Oklahoma′s few remaining lesser prairie chickens. I strongly encourage everyone engaged in energy development in western Oklahoma to utilize this valuable new tool to plan future projects that protect, rather than destroy, one of our state′s most threatened prairie species.″

Researchers have found that lesser prairie chickens, particularly nesting hens, avoid vertical structures because they are often used as perches by predators such as hawks, eagles and owls. Habitat fragmentation caused by a number of factors including transmission lines, roads and highways, buildings and tree encroachment into prairie habitats, as well as conversion of native rangeland to cropland or non-native vegetation, can all be detrimental to lesser prairie chickens.

″The Wildlife Department understands that developers must consider a number of factors when planning locations but strongly encourages developers to use this tool in the planning process to minimize or eliminate negative impacts on the prairie chicken and their associated habitats,″ Horton said.

The Oklahoma Lesser Prairie Chicken Spatial Planning Tool was developed in cooperation with the Secretary of Environment, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, The Nature Conservancy, OSU Extension, G.M. Sutton Avian Research Center and the Playa Lakes Joint Venture.

″Tools such as the Oklahoma Lesser Prairie Chicken Spatial Planning Tool, in conjunction with on-going prairie conservation actions, will be important to strategically conserve the prairie chicken and it′s habitat and to preclude the need to list the species under the Endangered Species Act, all while still meeting the energy needs of the United States,″ said Ken Frazier, assistant field supervisor for the Oklahoma Ecological Services Field Office of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

In addition to helping determine areas where development would least impact prairie chickens, the Spatial Planning Tool also can be used in assessing the cost of developments within the lesser prairie chicken′s range, as well as to prioritize areas and costs for prairie chicken habitat restoration and recovery efforts. If it is necessary to site a project or structure in an area that will impact lesser prairie chickens, the Department hopes developers will use the tool to determine a voluntary contribution to offset the impacts of that development.

The Oklahoma Lesser Prairie Chicken Spatial Planning Tool, available on the Wildlife Department′s Web site at http://www.wildlifedepartment.com/lepcdevelopmentplanning.htm, is provided in formats compatible with both GIS (.img) and Google Earth (.kmz). Maps in both 8.5″ x 14″ and 33″ x 44″ are also available.

″The unique habitats found in northwest Oklahoma are invaluable to wildlife as well as to wind energy development, so the Wildlife Department and energy developers have to work together to ensure that our state′s wildlife heritage remains strong,″ Horton said. ″To that end, we have used the model to create maps showing areas where wind resources are suitable for development, with minimal effect or no effects at all on the lesser prairie chicken.″

For more information about the lesser prairie chicken, go to wildlifedepartment.com.

Oklahoma Wind Energy: Keeping it Green

Oklahoma is blessed with many things, not the least of which is our powerful wind resource--the subject of the opening line in our state song! In fact, Oklahoma's wind resource is so significant that a recently released study from the U.S. Department of Energy projects Oklahoma to become one of the top two states in wind energy production within the next couple of decades.

While Oklahoma′s potential to multiply more than twenty-fold its generation of clean, inexhaustible wind energy is great news for both our economy and our environment, it can only remain “green” if developed in harmony with Oklahoma′s most sensitive wildlife species. Of chief concern is Oklahoma’s seriously imperiled Lesser Prairie Chicken population, which once boomed across the western third of our state but has since been relegated to a few scattered pockets of rangeland in seven counties.

Our particular challenge in the context of a burgeoning wind industry in Oklahoma is the fact that these few remaining populations of Lesser Prairie Chicken exist in many of the very same locations as our prime wind resource. Probably the greatest challenge in avoiding competition between these overlapping interests lies in the fact that Lesser Prairie Chickens have such a strong, innate aversion to anything tall on the horizon. This means that the placement of wind turbines over 300-feet in height, not to mention the location of hundreds of miles of transmission lines, can have a serious impact on the survival of this majestic game bird in Oklahoma. Developers building transmission lines or installing wind turbines should avoid locations where the Lesser Prairie Chicken exists.

As Oklahomans, it is our duty to save one of our iconic prairie bird species from the brink of extinction. And as providers of a green, environmentally friendly choice of energy, I am sure the wind industry will join us in rising to this challenge by helping us to save, rather than displace, Oklahoma’s Lesser Prairie Chickens.