HUTCHINSON, KANSAS

By Kevin Fedarko

A troupe of self-described "environmental experts and old farts" are at their regular table at Skaets Steak Shop, the tiny cafe where they meet at the beginning of each day for breakfast and banter. The coming of spring has brought to the table a new topic to replace, for a moment, the wheat and the weather: the fate of a colony of prairie dogs that has taken up residence in the Kansas State Fairgrounds, right where the town of Hutchinson intends to build a couple of new baseball fields.

There is some consensus here, and indeed throughout Hutchinson, about what should be done: "Kill the damn things." But the men at Skaets disagree somewhat on tactics. Earle Smith, a "semiretired" carpet retailer, proposes opening the fairgrounds to hunters and charging "a dollar a dog." Bill Moran, a fully retired manager of a grain company, thinks they could be a fine addition to the menu at Skaets. And Don Collins Jr., who still has a few years before retirement, looks through the window at the cold rain and suggests that the offending rodents might make excellent earmuffs.

These exterminators, however, face some stiff opposition. In recent years, prairie dogs have enlisted formidable allies. Scientists call prairie dogs a "keystone" of the Great Plains ecosystem because their dens serve as motels for many other mammals, insects and even birds. Researchers are beginning to discover how their barks and squeaks constitute one of the most complex languages in the animal kingdom. Animal-rights advocates defend the winsome fur balls: they are, in the words of a Hutchinson member of the Doris Day Animal League, "delightful to watch, even if they are of the rodent form."

The story of how these groups clashed and ultimately settled their differences offers a glimpse into precisely the kind of grass-roots democracy the Founding Fathers might have envisioned--had they had the imagination to conceive that a rodent the size of a can of tennis balls could embroil Hutchinson in its most explosive animal-rights debate since last summer. (That was when a dog was accidentally dragged down Main Street from the back of a pickup truck.) The ruckus erupted earlier this year when the city decided that a patch of grass at the back of the fairgrounds was perfect for building two new practice baseball diamonds. Perfect, at least, until Bill Moyer, Hutchinson's parks superintendent, spotted about 75 squirrelly brown mammals popping in and out of burrows and mowing the lawn with their teeth.

Cynomys ludovicianus (known locally as sod poodles) have traditionally been viewed as pariahs of the prairie. They are detested by ranchers because their holes can snap the legs of livestock like dry twigs and their fur plays host to fleas that sometimes carry the plague. (Prairie dogs have infected 24 people in the U.S. in the past 27 years, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.) They are so unpopular that for decades the Federal Government has conducted poisoning campaigns to eradicate them from rangeland. Several rural communities even hold contests for "sport shooters," who find the animals stimulating targets because varmint-hunting cartridges disintegrate on impact, causing the dogs to explode into "red mist," a cloud of blood and vaporized rodent parts that offers hunters IVG, or instant visual gratification.

Moyer weighed his options. He could lace oats with strychnine and scatter it next to the burrows, bring in rattlesnakes to infiltrate the colony or simply drive over the field with a bulldozer. He could also invite people to shoot the dogs from the hoods of their pickup trucks (a method that recently received consideration in one Oklahoma town). In addition, there were some innovative devices on the market, including a portable flamethrower that injects propane gas into the burrows and incinerates the animals alive. But Moyer wisely ruled out these options on the ground that none were sanctioned by city ordinances. He confesses, however, that he briefly considered bringing in the "suck truck."

The brainchild of Gay Balfour, a welder and barbecue caterer from Cortez, Colo., the suck truck is a fan-driven vacuum system designed to Hoover prairie dogs from their holes. The dogs shoot through Balfour's 27-ft. suction hose at about 40 m.p.h., along with any skunks, cottontail rabbits or box turtles that may also be lurking below. The animals' progress is halted by a wall of 5-in. foam rubber, off which they ricochet into the tank of a "honey dipper," a truck normally used to clean out sewage lines. In the past, Balfour has sold a portion of his harvest to an exotic-pets broker, who marketed the rodents in Japan, where they command up to $350 each from consumers who presumably have not heard of prairie dogs' enthusiasm for chewing on curtains, wallpaper, furniture, electrical cords and other pets. The name of Balfour's business is Dog-Gone, and he charges $1,000 a day.

Not only was this too expensive for Hutchinson, but the town had no takers for the dogs. So Moyer advised his boss, city manager Joe Palacioz, that the animals should be killed with poison gas. When word of the plan got out, the fur really began to fly. Within a week, city hall was hearing from prairie-dog advocates as far away as Hawaii. And even within town, sympathy was growing. The manager of a local radio station that carries Rush Limbaugh pronounced the animals "creatures of God" and said he did not want them treated cruelly. That sentiment was echoed by several members of the town council, which ordered officials to find an alternative.

To the rescue came George Williams, a consultant for the Kansas corrections department, who had heard about the problem and thought the rodents might make a nice addition to his family's 40-acre wildlife preserve outside Topeka that is known as Bobcat Hollow. Having found a host, the town contacted the Prairie Ecosystem Conservation Alliance, a group of volunteers in Colorado. Next month a PECA field team will begin flushing the burrows with water and Mellow Yellow liquid dish soap. The bubbles will drive the animals out of their holes, where they will be snatched up, towel-dried, given a saline eyewash and placed in cages lined with straw for their journey to Bobcat Hollow. Any dogs refusing to evacuate in this manner will be gassed.

All of which still leaves just about everyone with something to complain about. The dog defenders must accept that some of the animals will surely die. The kids have to wait yet another year for their ball fields. And taxpayers will have to foot an extra bill for flushing and relocating. But even so, the deal is a worthy achievement: after much rumpusing, Hutchinson has finally achieved detente in its prairie-dog war. Which means the retirement table at Skaets may have to move on to a new topic.