Two mule deer seen looking at the camera through sagebrush.

Fair Game

Who should pay for wildlife management?

By Hilary Byerly Flint 

“We’re pretty darn lucky,” says Brian Nesvik, director of the Wyoming Game and Fish Department.

Photo of two elk silhouetted against a sunset.

Elk Heyday

Booming elk numbers create a rare opportunity for hunting and tourism

By Janey Fugate

While scouting for mule deer on a chilly October evening in southeast Wyoming, the last thing I expected to see was several hundred elk.

Photo of a red fox sitting on a paved sidewalk near a sprinkler in a campground.

The Outdoor Recreation Ecosystem

How accounting for human behavior can improve wildlife management

By Molly Caldwell

On a summer evening in a Grand Teton National Park campground, the smell of barbecue drifts along a cooling breeze, signaling dinner time to nearby red foxes.

Cliff Notes

Cliff Notes

How place and technology meanings shape conflict around outdoor recreation development

By Wes Eaton and Curt Davidson 

In the fall of my first semester as a visiting professor at the University of Wyoming, a stranger knocked on the half-open door to my new office and said, “There’s a town in Wyoming where people are saying that an outdoor recreation development proposal is tearing their community apart. Want to look into it with me?”

Red and orange blanket flowers blooming through a tarp.

Wings Over Wyoming

Cultivating pollinator support at state parks

By Amy Marie Storey

In 2019, a plain mowed field in Oklahoma’s Sequoyah State Park transformed into an acre of wildflowers. The verdant space served both visitors and pollinators.

White dog and man walking on a trail.

Untethered

Managing off-leash dogs on public trails

By Sabrina White

“Boulder, as a town, has always been super supportive of dogs and people recreating together off-leash,” says Lisa Gonҫalo, recreation management coordinator for the City of Boulder Open Space and Mountain Parks.

Young pronghorn antelope buck walking on the prairie in wintertime with all the prairie grasses covered in a thick hoar frost. Canyon Ferry, Montana

Reciprocity and Sovereignty

An interview with Wes Martel on tribal wildlife conservation

By Temple Stoellinger

Wes Martel is the Senior Wind River Conservation Associate for the Greater Yellowstone Coalition. Previously, Martel served on the Eastern Shoshone Business Council for twenty years where he oversaw programs and legislation dealing with water, taxation, energy, and environment.

Flight Interrupted

Flight Interrupted

Biologist works to protect eagles on collision course with wind power

By Jill Bergman

There are places in Wyoming where the sky is more imposing than the land. The force of wind and emptiness define this spare country.

Leave it to Beaver

Leave it to Beaver

Returning to past practices for future water management

By Tesia Lin

In 2014, John Coffman arrived in Wyoming as The Nature Conservancy’s new steward for the Red Canyon Ranch and quickly encountered an unforgettable lesson.

Bison on Wind River

Bison on Wind River

Restoring a wildlife economy and revitalizing culture

By Janey Fugate

Rolling over a dirt road hemmed in sagebrush, Patti Baldes steered her ATV down to the bison herd that she and her husband, Jason Baldes, restored to the Wind River Indian Reservation after a 130-year absence.

A building on a truck with construction in the foreground

Not Fade Away

Communities in rural Montana reach beyond agriculture

By Samuel Western

I’m in upper eastern Montana, a land of undulating drainages, heading north on Highway 87.

A New Lease on State Land

A New Lease on State Land

How conservation is hoping to buy a seat at the land management table

By Birch Malotky

In early November 2020, the Wyoming Outdoor Council’s (WOC) staff huddled around a laptop and logged into their freshly minted account on energynet.com, an online marketplace where 199 leases for oil and gas development on Wyoming state trust lands were up for auction.

road at dusk with mountains

Science of Road Ecology

Researchers are changing the ways we see, think about, and manage our roadways

By Kristen Pope

“People don’t really think about this impact that roads have because roads and cars are such an important part of our life in North America,” says Western Transportation Institute (WTI) senior research scientist Tony Clevenger.

Bicyclist photographs a roadkill deer on a smartphone. Photo credit: Adventure Scientists

Ride for Roadkill

Montana cyclists are helping make the state’s roads safer for wildlife and people

By Birch Malotky

Crowell Herrick, 63, rides his gravel bike down Montana Highway 1, wearing a high-vis vest.

View inside a white bucket with several tiger salamanders and a ruler for scale. Photo credit: Cody Porter

Amphibian Crossing

By Rhiannon Jakopak

Carrying salamanders across roadways helps local populations persist

On a rainy April night when temperatures peeked just above freezing, around 30 people spread out along a well-traveled street next to a city park in Laramie, Wyoming.

Hine's Emerald Dragonfly clings to a dried plant.

Crouching Scientist, Hidden Dragonfly

A researcher’s quest to protect an endangered dragonfly

By Amber Furness

I stand on a large, cement bridge on Interstate 355 over the Des Plaines River Valley in northern Illinois. Waves of air blow over me as vehicles whiz by.

two people on motorcycle ride past devils tower

Road Noise

Traffic sounds disturb wildlife far beyond the asphalt

By Kristen Pope

Leather-clad motorcyclists cruised around Devils Tower National Monument in August 2015