The prarie dog thread got me thinkin about them. I seen one when i was a teenager probably mid 70s was in our pasture not too far from a junkpile in a fence row.. he was close, just across the fence from me setting in the pickup what i remember was quite red head and back , and black feet and ears.. real pretty animal, i watched him 10 minutes or so he payed me no never mind... there were lots of flickertail gophers in the area at that time.. no prarie dogs in our area.

anyone else ever seen or caught one?? I told the game warden and he said there were a few around .

I seen one back when I was a kid that would have been in the 70s on a family trip to South Dakota/Wyoming/Montana, not even sure where we were at the time but remember that there were a lot of gophers around, at the time my dad had to stop me from trying to catch it, it was acting so tame and was only 20/30 yards away and totally unconcerned about us being there

I was stationed at Minot A.F.B. back in the late 80's. To this day I thought (I know) I saw one along a perimeter fence. It was also hunting flicker-tail gophers. Called ND Fish & Game, they told me most likely an escaped ferret. Don't think they followed up on it.

Research shows that a colony of them require 10,000 acres of prairie dog habitat to thrive. There are not many 10,000 acre plots of prairie dog habitat left due to increased farming practices over the past 100 years.
In 1987, there were only 18 black-footed ferrets known to exist worldwide, most in captivity. That is a very shallow gene pool, which does not lend itself to adaptability to use other food sources other than prairie dogs.
Sad to say, but it seems likely that they do not have much of a chance of ever coming back in any significant way.

Ted Turner has a LOT of ground that covers 2 counties West river that has them and swift fox on there!

Talked to a guy that was friends with the guy that had the ranch where they found the ferrets.

and my grandmas cousin told her that the next door neighbor lady had a illegidimet child from that guy ... so that right there is proof they are not extinkt !!!