Evaluating Prairie Dog–Cattle Competition from the Perspective of a Ranching Enterprise in the Western Great Plains: Economic Analysis of Potential Effects on Long-Term Profitability

Prairie dogs and livestock have long been viewed as competitors for forage resources, causing widespread exterminations of prairie dogs, resulting in the decline of other threatened and endangered wildlife species. In this study we model the impacts that prairie dogs exhibit on the long-term profitability and cow herd dynamics of a ranch over a 40-yr production period on a representative cow-calf ranch operation in the Thunder Basin Ecoregion of Wyoming. More specifically, we evaluate the effects of prairie dogs on a cow-calf operation through two forage/livestock use assumptions; the first is simply loss of forage due to prairie dog consumption, and the second scenario assumes there is no available forage for livestock on prairie dog colonies. We also include three different potential prairie dog population dynamic scenarios: unmanaged prairie dogs, unmanaged prairie dogs with increased colony expansion during drought, and prairie dogs managed for a target colony size. As expected, our results indicate that prairie dogs decrease forage availability for grazing, thus reducing the average cow herd size on a ranch, the annual returns from livestock sales, and the maximized net present value of annual returns. Further, the magnitude of these impacts and the financial feasibility of managing prairie dogs largely depends on the effects prairie dogs exhibit on forage resources and how cattle use these forage resources.