Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
Serving Clovis, Portales and the Surrounding Communities
The federal government on March 27 listed the lesser prairie chicken as an endangered species.
More than seven weeks later, area farmers and agriculture officials still aren’t sure exactly what that means.
“Nobody gives me a square answer on this,” Roosevelt County Ag Agent Patrick Kircher said last week.
Kircher said he’s been trying to learn what the listing means to landowners and producers because he’d like to teach a seminar on the matter.
“I haven’t gotten very far on it. What I want is to find someone who can speak to the ins and outs of this deal,” Kircher said. “And not speak ‘governmentese.’”
Curry County Ag Agent Mason Grau said he’s also not clear on what the new designation means.
It seems like every time he meets with people from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, “they always seem to be changing something,” he said.
“We’ve seen a map and then a different map the next time.
“As soon as they can provide us with what the regulations will be in writing, producers will have a better idea what to do. From my understanding in the two meetings I’ve been to they’re trying to work with producers.”
Repeated attempts by The News to reach federal and state Game & Fish officials have been unsuccessful.
Roosevelt and Curry County commissioners have both expressed concern about an endangered listing for the birds, even before the designation became official.
Their views are shared by many area farmers, including Wendell Bostwick of Melrose.
“It’s all about protecting that bird,” Bostwick told The News last week. “I think you remember what happened with that spotted owl. Protections on it shut down the New Mexico logging industry and now wildfires are a problem.”
Bostwick said he formed his belief in how the protections may cause agriculture to be shut down by attending a USFWS hearing in Portales several years ago.
“More stringent policies are possible,” Bostwick said. “If the population of the LPC doesn’t improve they’ll increase protection of the bird until it’s stabilized and increasing.”
The entire region’s economy could be crippled if the government restricts farming practices in favor of the bird, Bostwick believes.
“That’s my whole concern,” he said. “What happens if our dairies can’t harvest their silage? What happens if we can’t harvest our crops? I just don’t want them to take away our way of living.”
Wes Robertson of Clovis is retired as an officer with the New Mexico Game and Fish Department. He doesn’t know what the feds are planning with the lesser prairie chicken, but he said the birds’ biggest enemies are weather and egg predation.
“The extraction (oil) industry has bigger impact than agriculture on prairie chickens,” Robertson said. “Prairie chickens won’t nest near vertical structures: Power poles, pumpjacks, tanks, windmills.”
Robertson said he doubts the new designation will have much of an additional impact on farmers.
“They already have protected status under state law and there are already protective and incentive programs for habitat protection/enhancement,” Robertson said.
