Prairie dogs disperse when all close kin have disappeared
Thursday, March 7, 2013 - 15:11
in Biology & Nature
Prairie dogs pull up stakes and look for a new place to live when all their close kin have disappeared from their home territory—a striking pattern of dispersal that has not been observed for any other species. This is according to a new study published in Science by behavioral ecologist John Hoogland, Professor at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science's Appalachian Laboratory. He has been studying the ecology and social behavior of prairie dogs in national parks in Arizona, South Dakota, and Utah for the last 40 years.