Passport to Texas

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife

The Texas Panhandle suffered devastating fires in March 2006. This month, a story by Texas Parks and Wildlife TV series producer Don Cash, highlights the habitat and wildlife before and after the blaze.

One of the places that burned during the panhandle fires was an area where I had shot a story three years earlier on lesser prairie chickens. So, I decided I would go and be able to compare before the fires, and went up a couple of weeks after the fires…

Trees, shrubs, uh, all the grass is gone. All cover. All habitat for all wildlife is at this point gone. For the most part the wildlife are on their own.

And then went back a year after the fires. And so its sort of a look at how the habitat makes a very strong comeback after fires like this.

These animals have living up here on the prairie for thousands and thousands of years. And this isn’t their first fire. They’ll come back, and they will all recover.

When I went up there three weeks after the fire, there were some areas that were just sand, which – a month before – had been hip deep in grasses. They had had a little bit of rain a week after the fires, and there was already plants starting to poke through four or five inches of sand that quickly. So, the land is very resilient. Nature does a good job of bringing itself back.

Thanks, Don. Visit passporttotexas.org for a complete listing of stations airing the series.

That’s our show for today…for Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.
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Texas Parks and Wildlife on PBS and Cable
Stations and Air Times
Times and dates are subject to change, especially during PBS membership drives.

• Amarillo, KACV-TV, Channel 2: October–March, Saturday 6 p.m.
• Austin, KLRU-TV, Channel 18: Monday, 12:30 p.m.; Friday 5:30 a.m.; Sunday, 9 a.m. KLRU2, Cable 20: Tuesday, 11 p.m.
• Bryan-College Station, KAMU-TV, Channel 15: Sunday, 5 p.m.; Thursday, 7 p.m.
• Corpus Christi, KEDT-TV, Channel 16: Sunday, 12 p.m.; Friday, 2 p.m.
• Dallas-Fort Worth, KERA-TV, Channel 13: October–March, Saturday, 6 p.m. Also serving Abilene, Denton, Longview, Marshall, San Angelo, Texarkana, Tyler, Wichita Falls and Sherman.
• El Paso, KCOS-TV, Channel 13: Saturday, 3 p.m.
• Harlingen, KMBH-TV, Channel 60: Sunday, 5 p.m. Also serving McAllen, Mission and Brownsville.
• Houston, KUHT-TV, Channel 8: Saturday, 3:30 p.m.; Friday 1:30 p.m. Also serving Beaumont, Port Arthur, Galveston, Texas City and Victoria.
• Killeen, KNCT-TV, Channel 46: Sunday, 5 p.m. Also serving Temple.
• Lubbock, KTXT-TV, Channel 5: Saturday, 10 a.m.
• Odessa-Midland, KPBT-TV, Channel 36: Saturday, 4:30 p.m.
• San Antonio and Laredo, KLRN-TV, Channel 9: Sunday, 1 p.m.
• Waco, KWBU-TV, Channel 34: Saturday, 3 p.m.
• Portales, New Mexico, KENW-TV, Channel 3: Sunday, 2:30 p.m.
• The New York Network, NYN, Thursday 8:30 p.m.; Saturday 2:30 p.m. Serving the Albany area.

Cable

Texas Parks & Wildlife can also be seen on a variety of government, educational and access cable channels in the following communities: Abilene, Allen, Atlanta, Boerne, Collin County Community College, Coppell, Del Mar College, Denton, Flower Mound, Frisco, Garland, Irving, McKinney, North Richland Hills, Plano, Rogers State University, Texarkana College, The Colony, Tyler, Waco and Wichita Falls. Check your local listings for days and times.

TPW TV - Panhandle Fires Then and Now Play Now | Play in Popup | Download