Why did the ornithologist strap a taxidermy badger to a remote controlled car and drive it around the prairie? To interrogate the secret world of animal eavesdropping in the grasslands, of course! Today on the show we travel to the most imperiled ecosystem on the planet to unravel a prairie mystery and find out why prairie dogs are grassland engineers worth keeping tabs on.
Got a question about other animal ecosystem engineers? Email us at shortwave@npr.org.
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This episode was produced by Berly McCoy, edited by Rebecca Ramirez and fact-checked by Tyler Jones. Robert Rodriguez was the audio engineer.
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