GOVE COUNTY — The size and color of Easter peeps with a few chocolate smudges for camo, the eight fuzzball chicks spent their first post-egg night clustered beneath a hen for warmth and security. Their hours-old life of simplicity turned to chaos last Sunday's dawn when the hen flushed and gave an alarm call that scattered the brood like a rack of well-smacked pool balls. Rather than the jaws of a coyote, it was the quick hands of Reid Plumb and two helpers that snatched up the chicks. Minutes later two of the little lesser prairie chickens carried tracking transmitters one-fourth the size and weight of a dime as they ran to the comforting calls of the hen. In about 10 days the birds...
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