Sir

In their Commentary “Re-wilding North America” (Nature 436, 913–914; 2005), Josh Donlan and colleagues propose introducing Asian and African species to the Great Plains. But they do not discuss a real effort that is already under way to restore native North American prairie wildlife on the Northern Great Plains.

The World Wildlife Fund and its partner, the American Prairie Foundation, have launched an ambitious programme to purchase, from willing sellers, property in north-central Montana. When combined with adjacent public lands, this would provide the habitat for nearly the entire suite of North American grassland species that have lived here within the past 10,000 years.

These efforts envisage reintroducing bison from remaining genetically pure herds and providing habitat that will support increasing populations of nearly extinct species such as black-footed ferrets. If all goes well, there will be an increase in populations of pronghorns, elks, mountain plovers, burrowing owls and large predators such as mountain lions — our native felid, which has already recolonized this area without human intervention. At least parts of the megafauna-dominated landscape can be restored in a few decades, and Pleistocene survivors such as bison will once again be able to play their role as ecological engineers.

This restoration of native prairie wildlife is being carried out in cooperation with local landowners and communities. It addresses concerns about the return of prairie species that, in some cases, have been absent for a century or more. Restoring the native fauna of this region first is a more economically viable and ecologically sound approach, if the goal is to energize positive support for conservation in general.