Heads Up February 7, 2025

Starting as early as Monday, Feb. 10, the City of Boulder will unfortunately need to remove prairie dogs using lethal control practices at Foothills Community Park consistent with city ordinances, plans and policies. The upcoming management practice will follow:

• A 2015 city management plan that directs Boulder Parks and Recreation and Open Space and Mountain Parks to maintain the site as prairie dog-free to reduce recreational conflicts in the area and protect city investments in heavily used sports fields, parkland, flood control structures and irrigations systems. This management strategy was developed following the relocation of 647 prairie dogs from the area in 2013 and 2014.
• The Urban Wildlife Management Plan, which directs the city to permanently exclude prairie dogs from the Foothills Community Park area. It emphasizes humane, non-lethal control of prairie dogs whenever feasible.
• The city’s Wildlife Protection Ordinance, which requires a landowner – including the city itself – to satisfactorily demonstrate that all non-lethal options for managing prairie dogs on a site were considered and were deemed not feasible.

Boulder Parks and Recreation and Open Space and Mountain Parks staff have been monitoring prairie dogs in the Foothills Community Park area in accordance with these plans. When staff monitored the area at the end of 2024, they observed the re-emergence of prairie dogs in the exclusion area.

Following city plans and policies and to protect a highly utilized recreation space, staff have evaluated and determined that removal of ~15 prairie dogs in the park area – where the city has conducted extensive relocation work and lethal control measures in 2013, 2014 and 2020 – would best be accomplished through lethal control because:

• Relocation is not possible because there are no available locations to move them.
• Other methods of lethal control, such as trapping and donating to a wildlife program, were deemed not feasible given timing, site conditions and animal behavior.
• Prairie dogs in this area are difficult to trap because of constant exposure to humans and their pets, which makes them particularly shy of disturbances and traps.

City staff are taking these steps before March 1 to minimize breeding in the area after determining non-lethal options were not feasible in a process consistent with the Wildlife Protection Ordinance and the Urban Wildlife Management Plan. The work is weather dependent.

If you have any questions, please reach out to Parks and Recreation Director Ali Rhodes at 303- 413-7249 or rhodesa@bouldercolorado.gov.

Regards,

Nuria