Data from: Patterns in lek persistence and attendance by lesser prairie chicken Tympanuchus pallidicinctus near a wind energy facility in southern Kansas
Data files
Nov 17, 2025 version files 30.34 KB
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ManuscriptData.xlsx
27.87 KB
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README.md
2.46 KB
Abstract
As wind energy development expands across the Great Plains, there is potential to adversely affect species that require undisturbed tracts of native grasslands, such as the lesser prairie-chicken (LEPC) Tympanuchus pallidicinctus. Effects of wind development on LEPC movement and demographic rates have been minimal when turbines are sited in cultivated cropland and grassland habitats are available nearby, but there are gaps in the overall understanding of how LEPC populations will respond to wind energy development over the long term. Reducing these knowledge gaps and improving our decision-making process is key to balancing the needs of the wind energy industry and conservation of the species. We evaluated trends in LEPC lek attendance and persistence following construction of the Cimarron Bend Wind Resource Area (CBWRA) in southern Kansas, USA, from 2017 to 2024. We used Bayesian generalized linear regression models to evaluate lek stability and the probability of lek abandonment with various environmental and anthropogenic covariates. We modeled total lek attendance with years since facility construction as a predictor. Of the 37 leks included in analysis, we found leks located in areas with relatively higher density of turbines and had lower annual attendance were less stable, and leks located in areas with relatively higher grass cover were less likely to be abandoned over our eight years of monitoring. However, these effects did not seem to negatively impact the local LEPC population at CBWRA, given that the total lek attendance had a positive trend across the 8-year study, providing additional support that siting turbines in cultivated croplands and conserving large intact tracts of grasslands appear to be important minimization measures for LEPC. Regardless, it remains to be seen how LEPC would be impacted by wind energy development in intact grassland-dominated landscapes (i.e. core habitat).
Dataset DOI: 10.5061/dryad.msbcc2g91
Description of the data and file structure
Lesser Prairie Chicken counts from lek sites within range of wind energy facility from 2016-2024. Includes environmental covariates used in modelling patterns in lek attendance.
Files and variables
File: ManuscriptData.xlsx
Description:
metadata - provides a description for each column in the provided data
LekCountData - Lesser Prairie Chicken yearly count data and associated environmental covariates
BlinkOutData - Data used to analyze whether lek attendance patterns changed from 2017-2020 to 2021-2024
Variables
| LekName | Unique identifier for each individual lek |
|---|---|
| Year | Year that the lek was observed |
| MaxCount | Max count of all lesser prairie chicken individuals at a lek |
| presence | Indicator whether the lek was active by LEPC in a given year |
| Ag_prop_1045 | Proportion of agricultural landcover within ~1km of the lek |
| grass_1045 | Proportion of grass landcover within ~1km of the lek |
| turb_count_1000 | Number of turbines within 1km of lek |
| turb_count_2000 | Number of turbines within 2km of lek |
| turb_count_5000 | Number of turbines within 5km of lek |
| blinkOut | Indicator (0/1) of whether lek attendance decreased (1) or did not decrease (0) from 2017-2020 to 2021-2024 |
| MedianCount | Median max count of LEPC at a lek when the lek was active |
Code/software
Mircosoft Excel or open source equivalent
