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In the summer of 2014, I had the opportunity to join the Arizona Game & Fish Department with the trapping and processing of prairie dogs. This three-day effort gained vital information about the efficacy of the oral sylvatic plague vaccine (SPV) in prairie dog colonies found there.

Each evening, the live traps were baited with a tempting concoction of sweet feed, carrots, and peanut butter. The traps were opened and placed near active burrows within the designated research area. There were two trapping locations, approximately 5-10 miles from one another. One group of prairie dogs received the oral vaccine while the other the placebo, although we were blind to the identity of which. After setting all of the traps, we carefully made our way back to our vehicles, dodging gaping burrows and rattlesnakes by the light of our headlamps, and returned back to base camp.

Once a prairie dog was discovered in a trap the following morning, we quickly covered it with a drape to minimize stress and injury, tagged the cage with brightly-colored flagging marker corresponding to burrow number, and then loaded them into the bed of a truck to be taken to the processing center.

Processing involved recording weight, hind foot length, and sex; combing for fleas over a water bath and placing the fleas into ethanol collection vials; collecting whiskers, fur, and toenail trimmings; obtaining blood samples; and placing ear tags and PIT tags for identification purposes. The vaccine contains a biomarker, Rhodamine B, which is detectable in hair, blood, and feces when the bait is ingested. After all of the necessary samples were collected, the prairie dogs were released back into the burrows from which they were captured from.

Plague was later confirmed from a dead prairie dog collected at the site.