Paper short abstract:

From 1890 to 1920, farmers plowed the wetland ecosystem of the North American Prairie Pothole Region, contributing to the extirpation and decimation of the whooping crane. Kristen Greteman examines the near-extinction of the species, and the efforts to conserve it, through a transnational lens.

Paper long abstract:

One-hundred seventy-six years ago, land use decisions put into motion the extirpation of the Whooping Crane in Iowa. By the turn of the twentieth-century, nesting cranes in Iowa were virtually nonexistent. Prior to this, the northern Iowa Prairie Pothole ecosystem was the historic breeding center for the species in North America. Over the course of a few decades, Euro-Americans changed the prairie wetland ecosystem into some of the highest functioning agricultural land in the world. In the process, they ousted the Whooping Cranes from the most important place in their historic habitat range. This land use change resulted in the almost-extinction of the species. By 1941, there were twenty-two left in North America. Today, the Whooping Crane is one of the rarest North American birds and an endangered species.

Using scientific and historical primary source data, this paper constructs a spatial narrative about the systems that worked for and against the whooping crane species. Some systems were deemed more valuable than others, and the decisions of a few changed the course for so many human and nonhuman beings. Only the coalition of multiple groups of people led to conservation efforts to protect the species from extinction.