Only a small handful of endangered species have been reunited with their respective populations in recent decades. The black-footed ferret (also known as the scientific name Mustela Nigripes) was thought to be one of the most endangered animals in the United States and completely wiped out from Canada. Black-footed ferrets were declared extinct in 1974, in 1981 a miracle happened when a ferret was discovered in Meeteetsee, Wyoming, when John and Lucille Hogg's ranch dog killed a black-footed ferret and took the animal home died; they took the body to an expert taxidermist Larry LaFranchie. This has become a great opportunity to save the species. In 1985 a terrible disease attacked the small ferret population and many of the remaining animals were taken into captivity in a desperate attempt to save what was left. Captive breeding was started soon after, and a reintroduction program began in 1991. In this article I will discuss the threats, habitat and habitat loss of the black-footed ferret, the importance of agriculture, and how affects the black-footed ferret today. and how prairie dog colonies affect where the black-footed ferret lives. I will discuss how they reproduce, their behaviors, and how important they are to an ecosystem. Ferrets are obligate predators of prairie dogs. This is known as a specialized predator because it eats only prairie dogs. Ferrets prey on prairie dogs and take advantage of their burrows for shelter and shelter. The ferret takes over the den by strangling and eating them. Black-footed ferrets eat many prairie dogs; a family of 4 ferrets eats up to 250 prairie dogs per year. Prairie dogs in the 20th century were persecuted as farmers... middle of paper... gue by fleas, or by eating dead prairie dogs that were infected and dying from it in their system. Through encounters with this disease, the US Army and the US Geological Survey invented a vaccine that has proven to be effective in preventing this disease. They inject this vaccine into the burrows, about 3 weeks later it provides lifelong immunity to the plague. Captive ferrets are injected with the vaccine before being released into the wild, and efforts have been made to inject wild ferrets, but attempting this is intense and time-consuming. Works Cited http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/14020/ 0 http://www.defenders.org/black-footed-ferret/basic-facts http://www.ferret-world.com/black- footedferrethabitat.html http://www.blackfootedferret.org/who-we -sono http://www.blackfootedferret.org/diseasehttp://www.blackfootedferret.org/history