Once thought to be extinct, the black-footed ferret has been among the wildlife in Utah since being reintroduced in 1999 and a colony in the Coyote Basin area of Uintah County is among the lucky locations in the United States to receive more of the ferrets from special breeding programs this year. The Utah Division of Wildlife Resources released 14 black-footed ferrets into the Coyote Basin colony in early November and will be releasing 11 more into the colony
on Thursday, November 15th
, shares DWR Conservation Outreach Manager Tonya Kieffer-Selby. “We are very fortunate this year to get some,” shares Selby. “They all took well to being relocated.” While the black-footed ferrets are nocturnal, wildlife officials know that the Coyote Basin colony still has wild ferrets after 3 were spotted in August during a night survey. “The hope is that the new ferrets will breed with the existing colony and continue to populate the area,” explains Selby. The success of reintroduction ebbs and flows across the U.S. due to habitat loss and disease. Prairie dogs are the ferrets main food source and unfortunately, the plague is a problem within prairie dog populations, including the Coyote Basin. As a result, black-footed ferret populations can be easily wiped out. They remain on the endangered species list and it is considered a special privilege for northeastern Utah to be the recipient of some of the new population this year.
