Plague outbreaks appeared for the first time in South Dakota last year just 38 miles (61 kilometers) from the Conata Basin, where the largest group of black-footed ferrets in the U.S. lives.

As the weather warms this year, wildlife officials are concerned that the plague may move further eastward and they will be unable to stop it. Plague is a deadly and easily transmissible infectious fever spread by fleas.

"We're pretty worried about what might happen this year," said Pete Gober, a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) in Pierre, South Dakota.

"If the plague comes back, we could lose a lot of those ferrets."

The weasel-like creatures were once plentiful in the plains, where they fed on prairie dogs. But a federal campaign to exterminate prairie dogs in 1950s and '60s killed nearly all of the ferrets' prey. Deprived of their food source, the ferrets were believed to be gone, too, by 1970.

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