Comment submitted by S. Cotten

Right now, America’s prairie dogs are being poisoned and suffering horrible deaths. Slowly bleeding to death -- even through their skin -- their agony can last weeks. The cause of their deaths: the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) shocking approval of the use of two incredibly toxic poisons known to cause wildlife deaths well beyond their intended use -- Rozol and the morbidly named Kaput-D. Prairie dogs are an essential part of healthy prairie ecosystems; they are a food source for predators, maintain short vegetation, and dig burrows that many other animals also use. But these keystone mammals already have been eradicated from more than 95% of their historic range across the Great Plains! Scientists at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have questioned the EPA’s approval of Rozol and Kaput-D, citing serious concerns about the effects of these poisons on prairie ecosystems -- and especially on highly endangered black footed ferrets and imperiled swift fox, burrowing owls, bald and golden eagles and other wildlife linked to prairie dogs in the food chain. Yet these poisons are now being used to kill prairie dogs, threatening many of the imperiled prairie bids and mammals that we’ve fought so hard to rescue from extinction. C'mon...don't allow everything to be ruined...