Prairie Chickens

The Missouri Department of Conservation wants to help you discover nature and learn more about the greater prairie chicken.
This native bird once numbered in the hundreds of thousands in Missouri.
But fire suppression, the encroachment of trees on open landscapes and changes in land use during the past two centuries have reduced available habitat.
Today, less than one half of one percent of Missouri’s original prairie remain, and those remnants are scattered. Remaining grasslands are seldom managed to provide the needed habitat.
We know we don’t own and manage enough native prairie and grassland in the state to recover this species just on our property, we rely on partnerships with our neighboring farmers and ranchers in northern and western Missouri where prairie chickens remain to help maintain and even improve their habitat that’s available to them.
For more information about prairie chickens and what the conservation department is doing to help ensure their survival in Missouri, visit the Missouri Department of Conservation’s website mdc.mo.gov.