Sask. rancher supporting endangered species wins award

It's the last place in Saskatchewan where you can find the dancing sage-grouse and short-horned lizards alongside cattle.

Thanks to a Saskatchewan farm family, some endangered at-risk species have continued to thrive on a section of land just south of Fir Mountain, Sask., on the northern edge of Grasslands National Park, about 246 kilometres south of Regina.

This week at the Saskatchewan Stock Growers Association conventions in Regina, Miles and Sheri Anderson were the proud recipients of the Saskatchewan Stock Growers Association Environmental Stewardship award. Miles said his secret to preserving these species is leaving them alone.

"I'm just fortunate enough to have land that I guess is conducive to the wildlife that doesn't exist in many places in Saskatchewan," Anderson told CBC Radio's Afternoon Edition. "You can say we preserved it on purpose because we never ploughed it, but we've never used it to the extent we could have."

Miles added he's caught his fair share of the dancing regimen the sage-grouse is known for, but after a while he's decided to just let them be.

"You have to get up early in the morning and it's in a very secluded part of the world so you have to be willing to get up and walk or ride a long ways to see it," Anderson said. "I don't bother them. I know where they are."

Anderson added his land sees a plethora of wildlife and despite having a herd of cattle, they don't seem to disrupt the natural harmony.

"We have antelope, short-horned lizards, hawks, short-eared owls, mule deer and elk, pretty much the gamut of what's on the endangered species list in Saskatchewan," Anderson said. "They mix perfectly well. We've always had livestock and I guess we've always had wildlife."