Animal Directory Featured species in the planned Conservation Center habitat
Black-footed Ferret
Mustela nigripes
EN
Fun facts
- North America's only native ferret species — believed extinct twice in the 20th century, and rediscovered in 1981 when a Wyoming ranch dog brought one home.
- The entire modern population descends from just seven captive founders rescued in the mid-1980s, making it one of the most genetically bottlenecked recoveries in conservation.
- Specialist predator of prairie dogs — over 90% of its diet by mass — which means its recovery is locked to the recovery of prairie-dog colonies.
- In 2020 a female named Elizabeth Ann became the first US endangered species ever cloned, from cells frozen in 1988, broadening the gene pool of the captive herd.
- IUCN downlisted the species from Extinct in the Wild to Endangered in 2008 — a rare, real-time conservation status improvement still pointed to as a model recovery.
From the master plan
The Black-footed Ferret is the first ambassador animal of the Conservation Center finale — the species used to show guests that the worst-case label, “Extinct in the Wild,” is not always the last word. Staged in a low-light burrow exhibit near the recovery-stories wall.
IUCN status sourced from the Black-footed Ferret assessment (Belant et al., 2015) on the IUCN Red List — listed as Endangered, downlisted from Critically Endangered following sustained reintroduction success.