By MIKE CORN

mcorn@dailynews.net

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service once again has determined it might be prudent to include the black-tailed prairie dog on the federal endangered species list.

The finding is preliminary, but sets the stage for a full-fledged investigation that could result in the animal receiving some type of protection.

While the finding was hailed by environmental groups, prairie dog opponents decried it.

Ironically, the determination -- made public Tuesday as part of a legal settlement -- was made in part because local, state and federal agencies have done little to ensure survival of the animal.

Also Tuesday, Logan County started the process to once again begin poisoning land where 48 endangered black-footed ferrets have been released.

Tuesday's determination by the federal wildlife agency found that since black-tailed prairie dogs were removed as a candidate for the endangered list in 2004, an all-out war has been waged against the animals by ranchers with the aid of state agricultural departments, which have approved a variety of chemicals to use.

While those chemicals were mentioned in the 9-page finding published in Tuesday's Federal Register, it was the sale of zinc phosphide from South Dakota alone that was used to demonstrate the assault being waged on prairie dogs.

"To provide some prospective," the determination states, if the United States has 2.1 million acres of prairie dog-inhabited land, "enough poison has been sold by this single facility since 2004 to poison all occupied habitat in the United States with enough remaining to poison an additional 1 million acres."

It's not known how much Rozol -- largely the poison of choice in Kansas -- with its active ingredient of chlorophacinone or pesticides containing diphacinone has been sold.

The direction of Tuesday's announcement came as something of a surprise to people on both sides of the prairie dog issue.

"Wonderful," said Ron Klataske, director of the Audubon of Kansas.

He took particular aim at Logan County's long-running battle against prairie dogs on the ranch complex where the highly endangered ferrets have been released.

Logan County, Klataske said, has "indirectly, if not directly, been a party to the inclusion of prairie dogs on the endangered species list."

That's so, he said, because "virtually nothing has been done to follow up on implementation" of a prairie dog plan adopted by the Kansas Department of Wildlife and Parks.

Formulation of that plan came in the wake of an earlier determination by federal wildlife officials that prairie dogs were endangered. The committee creating the plan included environmentalists as well as members of the ranching community.

One of those members was Mike Beam, senior vice president of the Kansas Livestock Association.

While he opposes putting prairie dogs on the endangered species list, he said several proposals in the plan have not taken place.

One of those was a change in state law, which currently requires eradication of the prairie dogs as a pest. Efforts to change the law came in 2002, but language inserted into the House bill served as a poison pill that prevented a conference committee from even meeting, Beam said.

Beam said he and the KLA would "absolutely" oppose the listing of prairie dogs as endangered.

"We'll do all we can to keep that from being done," he said.