Tiny prairie grouse could hamper wind energy plans in Texas Panhandle, South Plains

A little prairie grouse could give the wind energy industry big fits. Should the lesser prairie chicken become listed as threatened or endangered – and it's close now – significant restrictions would be placed on companies hoping to plant towering turbines across a five-state region believed to have some of the nation's best wind energy potential. "We've never seen the likes of this," said Texas Parks and Wildlife Department wildlife biologist Heather Whitlaw, who is part of conservation efforts with the other states and believes the bird could be listed within two years. "Anybody who puts anything on our landscape would be evaluated in one form or another." Scientists believe the prairie chicken population has dropped 80 percent nationally since 1963, the result of habitat loss and fragmentation, population isolation, drought and changes in land use. They once numbered about 3 million across an area that stretches through eastern New Mexico, eastern Colorado, western Kansas, northwestern Oklahoma and parts of the Texas Panhandle and South Plains. Estimates show their population now at about 30,000. The birds' habitat could shrink more beginning in September, when 1.3 million acres in the five-state area come out of a federal land conservation program started about 25 years ago. Farmers and ranchers may then use the land as they wish – which could include crop cultivation that would eliminate more of the birds' breeding and nesting grounds...AP