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Last Updated on Thursday, 19 November 2009 02:14

Written by Christy Hemken

Cody — While some bighorn sheep challenges in Wyoming remain, other areas of the state are seeing success and growth in their herds.
    A challenge that remains is the static herd size of the Whiskey Mountain group above Dubois, while a success has been the transplant and growth of a herd to Devil’s Canyon on the west slope of the Big Horn Mountains and the first legal sheep tag issued in northeast Wyoming for the 2009 hunting season.
    There are 16 herd units identified in Wyoming, although some of them don’t currently support any bighorn sheep.
    “Statewide, about 90 percent of bighorns occur in eight core native herds, and the other 10 percent are in seven transplant herds,” says Wyoming Game and Fish Department (WGFD) Bighorn Sheep Coordinator Kevin Hurley, who’s based in Cody. Those eight core native herds occur in the northwestern quadrant of Wyoming.
    The statewide aggregate objective for bighorn sheep is 8,735, and the current estimate is just over 6,000 sheep. “We’re about a third under where we’d like to be. Are we ever going to get there? I’m not sure,” says Hurley.
    In the Whiskey Mountain herd, which has yet to recover from a die-off in the winter of 1990/1991, the objective is set at twice what the current estimate is.
    “That population was our source for multi-state transplants from 1949 through 1995, and we moved about 1,900 bighorns and placed about 1,500 in-state and 400 went to other Western states,” explains Hurley.
    Hurley says biologists speculate that a high density of bighorns, particularly on winter range, contributes to die-offs. He adds that one way to control populations is through transplants, but there isn’t always a place to go with extra sheep. To remedy that, the Wyoming Legislature in their last session authorized the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission to offer reduced ewe/lamb licenses under HB 225.
    “The Department supported it, and it sailed through,” he says. “It won’t be used for the 2010 season because of the way regulations have to follow legislative timelines, but in 2011 we think there will be application and merit to offer some very limited, focused ewe/lamb licenses in certain areas.”
    In addition to population control, ongoing work in Whiskey Basin includes predator control, selenium research and prescribed burns to open up habitat. “There’s still a lot of work underway to get Whiskey Basin back on its feet,” says Hurley.
    In the Laramie Peak area the herd objective is 500 in Area 19, while the estimate is half that. “We took a lot of sheep from Whiskey Basin and put them at Laramie Peak over a 30-year period from the 1950s through the 1970s,” explains Hurley. “They’ve persisted, but not grown steadily.”
    However, he says in the last decade’s prescribed burns and wildfires have opened more habitat to the bighorns, which seems to be helping the population spread and increase.
    Another tactic implemented on Laramie Peak in 2007 is using sheep from areas other than Whiskey Basin to repopulate some of the lower, more arid bighorn sheep habitats.
    “I made arrangements with Montana to transplant 42 bighorns that were, in my view, a better match between the source sheep and target habitat,” says Hurley. “We’re trying to do a better job, instead of having Whiskey Basin as our one and only source, of trying something different that would be a better match for the habitat we’re trying to fill.”
    The same scenario has taken place in the Devil’s Canyon herd above Lovell in Area 12, where 39 sheep were taken from Whiskey Basin in 1973. “They persisted for 30-plus years, but never really grew. Six years ago we took a look and saw good habitat and potential and instead of repeating 35 years ago we tried a different source better adapted to the habitat,” says Hurley.
    Looking for sheep adapted to a dry river canyon or small mountain range in a low precipitation zone and low elevation with a higher percentage of shrubs than grasses for diet, Hurley partnered with Oregon and in December 2004 and moved 20 head from north central Oregon to Devil’s Canyon. Twenty more were moved to the area in January 2006 from the Missouri Breaks area of Montana.
    “That herd has grown from 50 or 60 to three times that,” notes Hurley of the transplant success.
    Taking the domestic sheep allotments on the Bighorn Mountains into account, Hurley says his agency has worked closely to avoid contact with domestic sheep. “The other thing about our source sheep is they’re known to be sedentary instead of migratory,” he says. “We wanted them to imprint and stay home and not pioneer and get into trouble.”
    “We’ve tried for 10 years to do the best job we can of trying to reoccupy historic and still suitable bighorn habitat without forcing or shoving domestic sheep producers on private or public allotments out of the way,” he says of meetings amongst all interested parties.
    In the immediate future another supplemental release is planned for the Seminoes. In December, 20 Oregon sheep will be moved in, and five weeks later 40 more from Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake in Utah, once again matching compatible source sheep to the destination habitat.
    Hurley lists some of the main factors in matching sheep to habitat as green-up of vegetation and lambing chronology. “As in domestic sheep, we want the lactating female to be in peak condition when she drops the lamb. What we think happened at the Seminoes before is we’d get high elevation alpine migratory sheep that were used to lambing in late May/early June and move them down to the Seminoes, which are much lower, hotter and dryer. The lambs were probably dropped when peak green-up was over and the ewes had already started on downhill slide when the lamb was born and they couldn’t nurse them adequately, they weaned them earlier and at a lighter weight and they didn’t make it,” he explains. “What we’re trying for with Oregon and Utah are sheep that lamb earlier so we more closely coincide with peak green-up.”
    In other issues, biologists are weighing the impacts of beetle kill. While the thinning of the trees will expand bighorn habitat, that also means they’ll roam farther and potentially create more conflicts with domestic sheep.
    On a West-wide perspective, there are 14 states with a wild sheep resource, and the issue of contact between domestic and wild sheep is the number one or number two concern in all of them. While Hurley describes Idaho as “ground zero” in separation efforts, the Sierra Nevadas on the Nevada/California border have federally listed the bighorn sheep. That listing comes alongside a multi-generational long-term domestic sheep grazing tradition on the federal lands of the region.
    Christy Hemken is assistant editor of the Wyoming Livestock Roundup and can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

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Last Updated on Friday, 26 February 2010 08:18

Written by Christy Martinez

Wheatland – Cheyenne attorney Karen Budd-Falen and the Western Legacy Alliance (WLA) keep digging, and the more they dig the more dollars are added to the figure awarded to U.S. environmental groups under the Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA).
“In this issue we’re working with, certain environmental groups are being paid by the federal government to sue the federal government to eliminate you,” Budd-Falen told a group of farmers and ranchers gathered in Wheatland Jan. 22.
EAJA was passed with the premise that if an individual sues the federal government, and wins, and the federal government is determined to have taken an “unjustified position,” then the federal government should pay the attorney’s fees.
“The federal government used to account for the attorney’s fees, and one could see how much money went to who,” noted Budd-Falen, adding, “In 1995 Clinton signed the Paperwork Reduction Act, which said the accounting wasn’t needed, but they kept paying the money.”
There are two basic statutes that fund the lawsuits. The passage of EAJA created a “Judgment Fund,” and between 2003 and 2007 the federal government spent $4.7 billion from that account, which is supplied by taxpayers. The Judgment Fund is an “offline Congressional fund,” which means Congress reauthorizes the fund with no dollar figure attached.
The second funding source EAJA takes money from is the losing agency’s budget.
“It’s a self-perpetuating cycle, and it’s no wonder the agencies can’t get anything done. Their budget is being spent on attorney’s fees,” said Budd-Falen.
“We wrote the Justice Department and asked what the money was spent on,” said Budd-Falen. “They wrote back and said they had no idea. They couldn’t tell us how many suits, by whom they were filed, or the hourly rate paid for attorney’s fees.”
“We figured out through EAJA and the Judgment Fund environmental groups are collecting law fees at $650 per hour for their attorneys to litigate against the federal government,” she added.
Although EAJA caps hourly attorney fees at $125 per hour, the environmental groups have convinced the courts that environmental law is a specialty and they should get paid additional funds, says Budd-Falen.
Additionally, EAJA sets forth a $7 million net worth cap, which means that an individual or business worth more than $7 million doesn’t qualify for attorney’s fees.
“But if you’re a ‘non-profit’ like the Sierra Club, there’s no qualifying cap,” explained Budd-Falen. “At last count, Sierra Club’s net worth was $100 million, but they can get attorney’s fees because they’re ‘non-profit public interest.’”
Budd-Falen added the president of the Environmental Defense Fund makes $500,000 per year, while the Natural Resources Defense Council president takes home $432,000.
“The real killer is these groups aren’t suing over whether a species should be listed, but rather over procedure,” said Budd-Falen of the cases that take issue with the federal government’s failure to deliver 90-day findings on the multiple petitions to list. “The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service gets hundreds of petitions, and can’t get them done in 90 days. They wait until day 91, sue in federal court and get their money back.”
According to Budd-Falen, the grand total of tax dollars awarded under EAJA, including attorney’s fees and court-ordered “donations” to environmental groups by both private industry and the federal government, comes to $41,870,398. And that doesn’t include an estimate of the one-third of cases in which the settlement is undisclosed.
“That’s your tax dollars,” she noted. “And an amazing waste of money to a bunch of groups that don’t care about the environment and won’t say they’re capitalists.”
The $41.8 million payment includes 20 states and 14 environmental groups, including the Wyoming Outdoor Council. Of the 1,269 total cases filed, there were 579 in which attorney’s fees were paid and 55 of those indicate attorney’s fees were paid, with no figure on how much.
Of the $41.8 million, the federal government paid up $37,154,410, while private companies contributed $4,156,488 – $555,000 of that ordered for straight donations to environmental groups.
“Until we started attaching actual dollars to EAJA, nobody paid much attention,” said Budd-Falen. “When we attached dollars, we got traction.”
Wyoming has had 14 cases filed by the Wyoming Outdoor Council in the last nine years, and $187,000 has been paid for attorney’s fees in the state. In that same time period two environmental groups in Washington State have received $2,730,000, while groups in Oregon have been paid $4,278,000, plus requirements that the federal government make $523,500 in donations.
“That’s blackmail,” said Budd-Falen. “And the federal government’s agreeing to it. Your tax dollars are being blackmailed.”
She said Wyoming Representative Cynthia Lummis is expected to bring a bill, along with two Democratic and one Republican House member, to Congress by mid-February to address EAJA.
“Their bill will deal with the accountability part of the problem,” said Budd-Falen. “It would force the federal government to track and publish the numbers. It will shed public light on how much money we’re talking about.”
The WLA is also continuing work on the Eco Cowboy Program, which is a reality series that began filming in Arizona and will cover the EAJA issue and ranchers in the West. It’s expected to air in Fall 2010.
Another project focuses on correcting misinformation spread from environmental groups following court decisions.
“If you read the press releases from the environmental groups about what the court does, and the actual court decision, you’d think you’re reading two different things,” said Budd-Falen. “They don’t just shorten the decision for the press release.”
To set things right, WLA has a public relations person on staff who reads the court decisions and the environmental groups’ press releases, then issues information to clarify what really happened.
“They’re trying to get some of that accurate information out, because the general public reads the press releases and doesn’t know the difference,” said Budd-Falen.
For more information on WLA, visit www.westernlegacyalliance.org. Christy Hemken is managing editor of the Wyoming Livestock Roundup and can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

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Last Updated on Saturday, 29 October 2011 01:00

Written by Saige Albert

Sublette County – A Sublette County project will make miles of fenceline more friendly to migrating wildlife in the near future.

“Big game in our area will find more than 280 miles of previously-prohibitive fencing passable as they move between seasonal ranges by the end of 2012,” says the Wyoming Land Trust (WLT) of the Corridor Conservation Campaign (CCC). “That makes a real difference, not only for sustaining our wildlife populations, but for our community, as well.”

Wildlife habitat, part of which involves migration routes, is important to the survival of species and faces a number of threats, says the WLT.

“Wildlife have fragmented habitats,” says Rick Pallister of the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation on a video detailing the CCC. “They can’t get from one high quality piece of habitat to the next without going through a lot of obstacles.”

The CCC began in 2008 as a five-year program with the goal of building 500 miles of wildlife- and livestock-friendly fencing in Sublette County. These fences are built through key wildlife migration routes through the area.

“We mapped about 110 miles of fences in the first phase of the project, and, of that, 90 percent of the fences had some barrier to wildlife,” says Dave Marshall of KC Harvey, an environmental consulting firm. “We would often find a very low bottom strand. When antelope would try to get underneath, they would struggle.”

Harvey continues, “The fence inventory provided a really clear picture of where the barriers were for wildlife moving and provided a really good planning tool to take to landowners.”

For a fence to be wildlife and livestock friendly, the WLT says, “Fences are generally no more than 42 inches tall, with a smooth bottom wire at least 16 inches off the ground and 10, but preferably 12, inches between the top two wires.”

When the bottom wire is smooth, antelope are allowed to easily travel under the fences without getting caught. Additionally, the space between the top two wires allows wildlife to jump over the fence without their hind legs catching.

The five-year effort was divided into five phases.

Phase one involved modification of about 82 miles of fencing in the historic “Path of the Pronghorn” migration route. The route runs between Grand Teton National Park and Trapper’s Point in Sublette County. Completed in 2009, phase one monitoring efforts use game cameras mounted on the fences to show wildlife passing under and over the fences.

Phase two, which began in 2010, involves the modification of a route nearly 60 miles long for mule deer migrations. Approximately 200 miles of fence will be modified in this area. The Sublette Mule Deer Study, starting in the late 1990s, confirmed the mule deer migration route. At this point, 40 miles of fence have been modified as part of phase two.

The identification of corridors in phases three through five, with the Wyoming Game and Fish Department and other partners, will move the project forward in the coming years. Currently, migrations in the Ryegrass and Wyoming Range Front areas and areas along the Green River from Trapper’s Point south are potential targets for the continuation of the project.

“We’ve had to revise some timelines with the economic situation,” says Director of Conservation at WLT Jordan Vana. “Overall, things are going well.”

To monitor the success of the project, the WLT looks at the number of miles of modified fences, images from game cameras positioned on the fence and sharing GIS data on modified fence locations. By sharing GIS data, partner organizations are able to overlay radio-collar information and other data to determine whether corridors are being widely travelled and fences do not provide barriers.

WLT begins each part of the project by first identifying migration routes.

“Migration routes are based on sound science and public recognition and appreciation,” says the organization.

Then, with landowner permission, fences are inventoried and agreements for modifications to fences are reached. The fences are targeted as being functional for the landowners, yet friendly to wildlife needs.

The WLT hires fencing contractors through a competitive bid process. One important aspect of this project is that landowners incur no cost in building wildlife friendly fencing.

Finally, agreements are signed with both the contractors and landowners. Landowners are required to maintain the fence for a specified period of time, usually 20 years, according to the WLT.  

The CCC operates with a number of partners from industry and private corporations to environmental groups. The partners include BP, Bank of Sublette County, Bill Barrett Corporation, EnCana Oil and Gas, USA, Environmental Defense Fund, Good Sportsman Marketing, LLC, Greater Yellowstone Coalition, Heart of the Rockies Initiative, James Family Foundation, Jonah Interagency Mitigation and Reclamation Office, Mule Deer Foundation, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Pinedale Anticline Project Office, Patagonia, Pope and Young Club, QEP Resources, Inc., Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, Proactive Fitness and Rehab Center, Shell, Safari Club International, Teton Motors, Inc., WLC Engineering, Western Governors’ Association, Wyoming Wildlife and Natural Resource Trust, Wyoming Wildlife – The Foundation and private individuals and landowners.

A number of government entities also partner with the project, including the BLM, Bridger-Teton National Forest, UW Haub School and Ruckelshaus Institute of Environment and Natural Resources, Wyoming Department of Agriculture, Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, Wyoming Department of Transportation and the Wyoming Landscape Conservation Initiative.

“We need wildlife, and we need wild places. The WLT is working with private landowners, working with the agencies and working with energy companies – taking mitigation dollars, private dollars and some government dollars – and putting it together for something that is fantastic for wildlife,” says Gray Thorton of the Wild Sheep Foundation. “We are protecting areas that need to be protected and ensuring that this corridor is maintained. This is a critical program.”

John Emmerich of the Wyoming Game and Fish Department also comments on the video, “We are actually creating permanent conservation in the sense of maintain these conservation corridors.”

Saige Albert is assistant editor of the Wyoming Livestock Roundup and can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

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Last Updated on Monday, 06 December 2010 08:31

Written by Heather Hamilton

Pinedale – “Our goal in this project was to modify fences found in migration corridors in a way that makes them workable for landowners, especially those in the ranching community with livestock, and passable for wildlife,” explains Wyoming Land Trust Director of Conservation Jordan Vana of the Corridor Conservation Campaign project in Sublette County.
“The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation held a meeting in Pinedale, where they said they could probably bring some significant money into Sublette County to help folks interested in modifying fences to make them passable for wildlife but still workable for the landowner.
“We volunteered to take the idea on, even though we are primarily involved in developing, buying and selling conservation easements. We believed in the project, felt it fit our broad motto, and already had a good relationship with many of the landowners located on migration routes. Due to being a non-profit, private organization we felt we might be in a better position to partner with a number of state and federal agencies without as much bureaucracy involved,” explains Vana.
After meeting with their board, the Wyoming Land Trust developed their Corridor Conservation Campaign. “It is a five-year effort to make 500 miles of existing fence in Sublette County workable for landowners and passable for wildlife at no cost to the landowner, and is split into five phases,” says Vana.
Phase One was the Path of the Pronghorn migration route, completed in late 2009.
“We began by visiting with a number of people, and some would say the animals have been making it through those fences for decades, and they didn’t think it was a problem that needed time or money invested into it. Then other people would say it was absolutely an issue, and the fences caused animals to bunch up and created stress. We decided to inventory all fences on the migration route and determine the scope of the issue before we spent time and money to solve it,” says Vana.
To do that, the land trust overlaid maps of the migration route determined through GIS data and maps showing land ownership and fence lines. Landowners with fences on the route were contacted by phone or sent a postcard explaining what the Wyoming Land Trust was, and what the Corridor Conservation Campaign hoped to accomplish.
“We explained that it would be at no cost to the producer and we would like permission, if the landowner was interested, to inventory their fences and see what condition they were in, how many wires they had and where gates were located. Most of the landowners said that would fine, and we inventoried a total of 107 miles of fence,” says Vana.
Then the Land Trust met with their staff, ranchers and state and federal wildlife experts to determine the best modifications for each fence. Meetings followed with each individual landowner to explain the modifications and reach an agreement.
“After speaking with all of the landowners, we let out a contract for the actual fence work and a company called Entercrest got phase one of the fencing contract. They modified a total of 82 miles of fence on the Path of the Pronghorn migration route in 2009,” says Vana. “We also entered into MOUs with each landowner, stating the Wyoming Land Trust would pay Entercrest, who would modify fences pursuant to what the landowner and the Trust agreed to. The landowner then agreed to maintain the fence in its modified condition for 15 or 20 years, depending on the contract.”
Fences were modified using Wyoming Game and Fish Department (WGFD) standards, which say the fence should be no more than 42 inches tall, with a smooth bottom wire at least 16 inches off the ground. There must be at least 10 inches, and preferably 12, between the top two wires, and the third wire is evenly spaced between the second and bottom wire.
“We typically replaced the bottom wire with smooth wire, and reused the other three wires as often as possible,” explains Vana. “We provided landowners the option of steel or wood posts.  We reused steel posts as often as possible, and on wood fences replaced any rotted or otherwise unusable wood posts. I told the fencing crew I wanted them to be able to look back when they were done and see a fence they would be proud to have on their place. It didn’t need to look brand new, since we were reusing as much material as possible, but we wanted it to look nice and straight and be in good overall shape.”
“It is a very common-sense project that allows folks to keep livestock in or out, and also saves them a little money to invest back in their operation or use to send a kid to college. It’s always a success when the ranching and wildlife communities benefit from a project,” notes Vana.
He adds that wildlife friendly fence doesn’t work in all situations, and that’s fine. Some producers left calving lots and other areas in mesh or other forms of fence, and there hasn’t been anything developed that works effectively at keeping sheep in while allowing wildlife to pass through.
Phase Two of the project began in 2010 and involves mule deer migrating from around the Hoeback Rim, down along the Wind Rivers to the Big Sandy area.
“That migration route was confirmed by a study that was part of the development of the Pinedale Anticline Gas Field. Work on Phase Two will continue into next year.
“Phase Three will probably focus on wildlife on the Wyoming Range in the western part of the county. Then we may do some work down along the Middle Green between Trappers Point and Highway 189,” explains Vana of the remainder of the project.
He adds a number of partners were integral in the completion of Phase One, and the continued success of the project. “It isn’t often you see the combination of partners we have on this project together, and we are really excited to see that,” says Vana.
For more information on the Corridor Conservation Campaign visit wyominglandtrust.org. Heather Hamilton is editor of the Wyoming Livestock Roundup and can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .