An estimated 266 whoopers - the largest wild flock of endangered whooping cranes - will migrate from Wood Buffalo National Park in the Canadian Northwest Territories to Aransas National Wildlife Refuge on the Gulf Coast of Texas this fall. This migration route takes them directly through the center of the Central Flyway ...threats to the flock, including water and land development in Texas, wind farm construction in the migration corridor, and tar sands waste ponds in Canada all increased in 2008.

Wind project developer, owner, and operator Horizon Wind Energy will offset the effects of its new wind farm in north central Kansas by investing in a 20,000 acres of offsite habitat restoration to benefit grassland birds, especially the greater prairie-chicken. Horizon Wind Energy signed the conservation investment agreement Wednesday with the Ranchland Trust of Kansas and The Nature Conservancy of Kansas.

Whooping cranes, one of the world's rarest birds, have waged a valiant battle against extinction. But federal officials warn of a new potential threat to the endangered whoopers: wind farms. Down to as few as 16 in 1941, the gargantuan birds that migrate 2,400 miles each fall from Canada to Texas, thanks to conservation efforts, now number about 266. But because wind energy, one of the fastest growing sources of renewable energy, has gained such traction, whooping cranes could again be at risk - from either crashing into the towering wind turbines and transmission lines or because of habitat lost to the wind farms. "Basically you can overlay the strongest, best areas for wind turbine development with the whooping crane migration corridor," said Tom Stehn, whooping crane coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Now those concerned about prairie chickens wonder whether a competing and more commercially marketable sound - that of the wind - will impact the chickens' booming. Research being conducted in this area under the direction of KSU biology professors Samantha Wisely and Brett Sandercock seeks to determine how the development of wind energy might impact prairie chickens.

Worries about the future of the local ecosystem have cropped up as debate swirls around the proposed Ellis County wind farm. A more specific target for these concerns has been prairie chickens - both lesser and greater prairie chickens make their homes in Kansas prairies.

Two Kansas State University biology professors are studying how wind farm turbines impact prairie chickens. Brett Sandercock and Samantha Wisely received a four-year, 630-thousand dollar grant from the National Wind Coordinating Committee Wildlife Workgroup, a national group of private landowners, energy developers and conservationists.

Funds are now in place to begin a four-year study to establish what impacts, if any, wind power facilities have on prairie-chicken demography and population genetics.

HAYS, Kan. - As interest in wind farms expands across Kansas, researchers are working to see how some of the state's native wildlife, particularly prairie chickens, are affected by the farms' huge turbines.