Conservation groups want a Texas court to overturn the recent gutting of federal protections for the lesser prairie chicken, a near-flightless bird living in the grasslands of Eastern New Mexico and four other states. In 2022, the Biden Administration offered the bird protection under the Endangered Species Act. The memo requested the judge side with opponents suing against the protections, which included the states of Texas, Kansas and Oklahoma, along with representatives from the ranching and petroleum industries. Rylen said arguments could be presented by this fall, but that the population lost all federal protections, including ones that prohibited hunting or killing the chickens. “The southern population of the lesser prairie chicken is now at severe risk of blinking out entirely,” he said.