I know this won't appear, but here goes. The Wyoming Game and Fish Dept., like many game and fish depts. around the nation are a political football, answerable to the politicians and political interests of their states. Those politicians are answerable to the Livestock and Farming interests before anything else. Therefore, one should not be surprised when they make what looks like moronic decisions regarding wildlife. Wyoming Game and Fish is doing what it probably started out to do--allow most of the wild forage to be consumed by cattle, or as much as possible, and still be able to say they are helping out hunters by feeding elk.

I cancelled a subscription to Wyoming's Game and Fish magazine a long time ago, realizing that their decisions are not what's best for their wildlife, but what's best for wildlife that still suits ranching interests. It was amazing to me that a state with some of the greatest diversity of large mammals rarely ever featured them in their magazine, and predators were almost NEVER in the magazine. Interesting take unless you know what the political atmosphere is in Wyoming.

You're absolutely correct about the Game and Fish Depts in any state with a measurable livestock population, being in bed with the livestock groups. The bison problem in Montana is a good example of one group, Montana Dept of Livestock, dictatating wildlife management policy. In this case....use brucellosis as an excuse to lethally control bison.

I am not an animal rights person, but I am sickened by how the states of Wyoming and Montana treat wildlife, a national treasure that thousands of people come to observe every year. If we are going to feed elk, then why don't we start hunting cows and sheep during the big game hunting season. The way Montana uses tax-payers money to needlessly kill bison might be one of the most wasteful and unnecessary things occurring in this country.

Quite frankly, the reason why Wyoming's hunters have largely ignored the dangers of feedgrounds is that they don't think. By and large, they don't look beyond the muzzles of their rifles to recognize the serious threats to hunting posed by the livestock industry's control of the Wyoming Game & Fish Department elk management plans. Part of the reason for this is that the livestock industry has successfully spread the lie that not only are predators dangerous for livestock, but also for wildlife. The group Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife, allegedly a "sportsman's" group, is actually a front for large landowners and outfitters who are determined to privatize wildlife and hunting for their commercial benefit. The group works quietly but actively behind the scenes to accomplish this. Overtly, SFW pounds the predator drum as well as constantly claims that closing feedgrounds would cause 80% of the elk in western Wyoming to starve. THe Wyo. G&F;Dept. also makes this false claim. The fact is that winter range for elk on most feedlots does exist, but it also is a fact that the forage on that winter range is reserved for cattle.

In short, whether in Wyoming or Montana, the issue is grass, and where the priorities for use of the grass lies, with wildlife or livestock. The decision is, as we know, for livestock. That's the excuse for locking up and controlling bison and elk.

As a consequence, in Wyoming, because chronic wasting disease is moving toward the feedgrounds, the State and the livestock industry are deliberately leaving elk open to an epidemic. When it happens, it's all over except for the shooting.

No doubt when it happens, hunters will end up pointing fingers, assigning blame. However, hunters will most certainly, along with the Wyo. G&F;Dept., the livestock industry, and conservation groups, be held responsible for doing nothing when something could be done--close feedgrounds.

Merit of the arguments aside, it should be clarified that this seems to be an opinion column by a Wyoming Outdoor Council staffer, not as New West presents it, an editorial expressing the opinion of the Casper Star-Tribune, The difference between the two is substantial.

The web posting of the editorial referred to in the above article did not indicate that it was a guest column, but that is apparently the case. A corrected version of this article has been posted on NewWest.net. I apologize for the error.--Bill Schneider

Bill

I have another correction. While Nadia White is correct that Meredith Taylor is a (part-time) staffer for the Wyoming Outdoor Council (WOC), Ms. White is not correct in implying that Ms. Taylor wrote the column to reflect the views of WOC on elk feedgrounds. The credit at the bottom of the guest column as published in the CST clearly identified Ms. Taylor as writing in her personal capacity as an outfitter, which she is, not as a representative of WOC.

Ms. Taylor and her husband are good friends and neighbors of mine, and I saw the column before it was sent to the Casper Star-Tribune, so I know in what capacity Ms. Taylor wrote the column and how it was published.

The fact is, the position of the Wyoming Outdoor Council on elk feedgrounds is decidedly whimpy, as WOC refuses to acknowledge the clear responsibility of the livestock industry in creating the feedground mess as well as the Wyoming Game & Fish Department's negligence in allowing the livestock industry to dictate elk management policy in western Wyoming. Understanding the cause of the problem is essential to solving the problem, and WOC refuses to acknowledge the facts, so its solutions are way off-base.

Robert

Boy, I'm chiming in late here, but here goes.
And it is all opinion.
Wyoming Wildlife, edited by Chris Madsen, is one of the finest outdoors mags in the US -- Madsen and his staff have never shirked any issue that I know of, and the writing and reporting on the issues affecting Wyoming wildlife serve as a reference for any western journalist and or writer.

The feedgrounds have been a festering sore for a long time, waiting to erupt, or to turn inward and result in systemic metaphorical and literal infection. There is a price, a mean one, for treating wildlife like livestock, and then turning around on opening day and pretending like it is all wildlife again. (The strange and ancient battle between the hunter and the pastoralist echoes all though this issue –it need not be pointed out that the pastoralists won the battle long ago, all across the planet – and not necessarily for good.

Wyoming's lawmakers --in my opinion-- have ignored the state's wildlife and treated it with disdain. Governor Fruedenthal is miles ahead of the legislature in the way he thinks about and values Wyoming's wild places and wildlife. He cannot seem to break the traditional cattlemen's and energy industry grip on the way the state treats its wildlife. Please check out how the governor tried to get a tiny tax on natural gas production to generate revenue to try and address some of the huge challenges the state's wildlife is facing with the drilling boom. It is not a pretty story. Check out how the Wyoming Game and Fish Department is funded. You will find that it gets short shrift in revenues, despite the fact that hunting and fishing are a huge part of the economy, and the visitors who come to see the state's unbelievable scenery and big game and other wildlife and birds number in the millions. I have never understood this, and I still don't.
Finally, please don't lump Montana into any blanket condemnation of western attitudes toward wildlife. Our game and fish people --my opinion--are among the best in the world. Montana is going to solve the bison problem, because it is too obviously broken now. Our Department of Livestock guys have been put in an impossible position by the broken brucellosis policy -- they are under a mandate to haze bison and will do so until the policy is changed and the situation addressed. They are not doing it for fun.

Montana bought the Game Ranges dating back to the early 1950's, to avoid ever having a situation like the feedgrounds. And they have worked. and they are beautiful, open spaces that provide for winter range and for just about every other wild species, and the citizens do not walk or ride horses on them during the months that the game needs them, and then they have them to wander in the summer months, and to hunt and look for horns and marvel at the raptors. The game ranges are an example of how public and private interests intermingle and create something larger than either, a definition of the common good, something almost at the brink of a new vision.

Check out Wyoming's wolf management plan for a glimpse into who (and who is it really?--this is a question for Mr. Hoskins, I believe) actually tries to run wildlife policy in Wyoming. Let me suggest, it's not the average common sense ranchers out there on the plains.

Check out Wyoming's stream access law, too, when looking into how it values the citizens and visitors who want to fish the rivers.

Not to toot Montana's horn too loudly, (we’ve got troubles aplenty, too) but in defense of a place that has been mighty good to its hunters and fishermen and its wildlife.

Hal Herring

I wanted to add--Wyoming's wildlife treatment has very little to do with the staffers at Wyoming Game and Fish. The agency has some of the west's best-- Harry Harju comes to mind, as does the late Tom Thorne. And these guys were the first in the US to nip the game farming industry in the bud, in a battle royale over the concept of public wildlife that nobody else had the guts to undertake.

Hal

Hal,

Recently, the same issue came up after articles I wrote about the anti-Wilderness policies of the Forest Service. We can't blame agency employees for bad policy forced on them by politicians. I'm sure it's the same with the Wyoming Game and Fish Department. It does not seem fair to blame agency professionals for political circumstances that are "above their pay grade." I'd bet a fair amount that biologists working for the WGFD agree that the elk feedlots should be closed, but of course, they can't say this out loud in public. They can, however, hurry along needed policy change by keeping the pressure on from the inside, stressing that science and professionalism, not politics, should dictate wildlife management. I'm sure the pros inside WGFD would rather systematically phase out the feedgrounds instead of waiting for a CWD outbreak where we have to "depopulate" elk herds on the feedgrounds and surrounding public and private land.

Bill Schneider

If anyone is still tuned into this article, I have a question.
I'm reading that the average rancher, the governor, and the Fish and Wildlife dept are all against the feeding grounds...who then, specifically, is pushing to keep them open, and what's the reasoning behind it??

J. Black,

To answer your question, the livestock industry has promoted the feedgrounds as a way to keep elk numbers high without allowing them to compete with domestic livestock for natural forage. In other states, wildlife departments have acquired key winter range for elk, keeping off cattle and sheep, which accomplishs the same goal--keeping elk populations high as well as providing open space for other forms of outdoor recreation and habitat for many species of wildlife in addition to elk. One thing is certain. No professional wildlife biologist favors continued operation of the elk feedlots.

Bill Schneider

Bill Hal and others

There seem to be some powerful misconceptions out there about the politics of wildlife management in Wyoming and who controls the politics.

Having lived in Wyoming for 13 years and having been intimately involved in wildlife conservation during that time, I hope that my conclusions warrant respect.

Regarding feedgrounds, they exist for one reason and one reason only: to protect forage on private and public lands for cattle and prevent elk from getting to that forage. It's about grass. Period. During the so-called Governor's Brucellosis Coordinating Committee meetings--these are the guys who came up with test & slaughter--ranchers from the upper Green River Basin, where many feedgrounds are located, made the importance of grass to them clear. They stated that for them, brucellosis wasn't a problem. This is not something we didn't know, but it was instructive to hear them admit it.

Brucellosis as a problem is a fraud. If you think rationally about it, if brucellosis were truly a problem for the livestock industry as it claims, then feedgrounds would already be closed. That the livestock industry and ranchers in the feedground areas refuse to countenance feedground closure should tell you that feedgrounds serve another purpose. And that purpose is to control elk management for the benefit of the livestock industry. The same power consideration drives bison management in Montana. It's about maintaining the power of the livestock industry over wildlife and wildlife management.

Ranchers, whether the powerful or the merely "common sensical," have traditionally worked against high numbers of game animals, whether elk, deer, or antelope in Wyoming for the same reason. This has been a dominant policy for decades, and it certainly isn't changing. So-called depredation hunts are common throughout the State. The mule deer disaster in southwestern Wyoming in the early 90s, when G&F;handed out numerous doe/fawn licenses, is directly due to the demand of ranchers to reduce numbers of deer.

The supposed benefits of high numbers of elk for hunters is at best a purely ancillary outcome of elk feedgrounds. It is now being used as a propaganda tool by the livestock industry, the big game outfitters, and some in the tourist industry to get people to oppose the closing of feedgrounds. You hear, for example, not only from commercial interests, but G&F;as well, that to close feedgrounds means that up to 80% of feedground elk will starve to death. This is clearly false, and deliberately so. THe claim is based upon another claim that no winter range is left for elk. However, if you read the annual G&F;Herd Unit reports, it is clear that the winter range is there, it's merely unavailable to elk because of the feedgrounds--that is, because of the ranchers and livestock industry.

Hal's comments about Wyoming seem partly on track, but mostly off-track. I find it interesting that Hal speaks highly of our governor and our G&F;Department. The fact is that Dave Freudenthal is playing both ends against the middle. He makes a great show of being in favor of wildlife, but his policies give the lie to that claim. He backed off so quickly on critical aspects of the so-called Wildlife Trust Bill--particularly, the level of funding and the demand of the livestock industry to prohibit the purchase of land for winter range--that he tripped all over himself. The Wildlife Trust is now nothing more than another subsidy to Ag. He talks a good game about the impacts of oil & gas, but it's nothing but talk. He does nothing and will do nothing. THe only thing he's interested in is re-election as a Democrat in a Republican state.

As far as G&F;is concerned, yes there are some good people in it, but there are also a fair number of those whose policy is go along to get along at all costs. There are professional biologists in the Dept. who do support feedgrounds--mostly in the Jackson-Pinedale Region. I have heard them say so.

Wyoming Wildlife has been subject to censorship for years. In the summer of 1998, Chris Madson informed me that he had been given a direct order not to do business with me ever again. This was the result of his having published an essay I wrote under the pen name Philip Elkhorn on the public trust. The order came from a rancher on the G&F;Commission who was doing his best to gain set aside hunting licenses for landowners such as himself. I had been working hard against the privatization of wildlife, which that particular Commission had been working hard to achieve, and my banning from Wyoming Wildlife was pure retalation for having spoken the truth about it.

Harry Harju has retired and Tom Thorne was killed in a car wreck with his wife Beth Williams last year. When Harry retired, he wrote a column for the Casper Star Tribune about the degree of control the livestock industry wielded over the Dept., including censorship of biologists and Wyoming Wildlife.

For the life of me I cannot understand the praise Tom Thorne has received. That fact is that he was a fraud. He took money from APHIS for years to run the elk vaccination program on the feedgrounds, and he constantly and publicly claimed success in reducing brucellosis in feedground elk. But curiously, he never submitteed his data to peer review. Never. When the State of Wyoming sued the National Elk Refuge in 1999 because the latter refused to allow vaccination of elk on the Refuge, the Refuge Director took Thorne's data and submitted it to peer review. THe results? The peer review found that Thorne's experimental design was inadequate and there were serious statistical errors. The peer review concluded that his data were so suspect that it would be impossible to come to any conclusions whatsoever aabout the success or failure of the program. In other words, the elk vaccination program was bad science. When the peer review was submitted to the court, G&F;suddenly changed its tune and quite claiming that the program was effective, and instead started claiming that it was causing no harm. I've read the case file and I can point to the specific legal brief where this switcheroo occurred.

Test and slaughter of elk was actually Thorne's idea and he argued for it vociferously during the final meetings of the Governor's Brucellosis Committee just before he was killed. THis guy cared about wildlife? Bullshit. He cared only about himself and his career.

I could go on and on. The fact is, there is currently no presssure from within the Dept. to close feedgrounds even though all biologists know what the consequences of feeding wildlife are.

There was an attempt in 95-96 to close a feedground--the North PIney Feedground--and encourge the elk to move to a feedground at a lower elevation that had over 30,000 acres of winter range around it. This was Bench Corral. The Dept. baited elk down to Bench Corral by lining hay down to the lower feedground. It worked wonderfully. However, the ranchers pitched a fit and the Dept. "leadership" immediately caved in. Unfortunately/fortunately, depending upon your point of view, the experiment worked so well that even when North Piney was reopened, the elk continued to move on down to Bench Corral, even with the best of hay laid down at North Piney. Now, North Piney is but a way station; when the snows build up, the elk move on down. So now, the Dept. complains mightily about wolves chasing elk off the feedground, which is deliberately false. The wolves are merely following the elk down to Bench Corral.

These days, the Dept. absolutely refuses to consider closing feedgrounds. I'm sure folks have seen Wyoming's recent CWD plan. That plan states that even when CWD hits the feedgrounds, the feedgrounds will remain open.

THe fact is, with feedgrounds, and wolves and bears, the Dept. has embraced a disturbing policy of deliberate dishonesty and falsehood,and is deliberately mismanaging wildlife for political reasons. I call that wilful negligence of a public trust. Why? Because the livestock industry runs the Dept. lock stock and barrel. I have concluded that it would best to disband the Dept. and transfer its functions to the Wyoming Dept. of Agriculture as the Game Ranching Division. That is precisely its function these days.

Some corrections, Hal. Wyoming has no stream access law. That's Montana.

Also, I don't know many common sense ranchers out there; there are a few, and I've worked for one. However, they have zero influence over policy. That's rooted in the Stockgrowers, the Farm Bureau, and the Outfitters.

In 1952, the Wildlife Management Institute conducted an audit of the G&F;Commission. Dr. Ira Gabrielson wrote the report. Here is an interesting quotation from pps 31-32 of the report:

"In previous studies of the fish and game laws of many states, no instance has been found in which the laws give so much special consideration to livestock operators at the expense of the fish and game resources as is found in Wyoming. The combined effects of the laws governing damage by game and beaver, the special antelope tags, and various other sections of the laws is to place a heavy, continuing, annual, fixed charge upon Fish and Game funds. These laws give consideration to a minority group far beyond that found necessary or desirable in any other state studied ... It is obvious that in some cases the earmarking of Fish and Game funds for these purposes by legislative action has so many undesirable features that it is difficult to believe that any legislature having any knowledge of or interest in the valuable fish and game resources of the state will continue it."

Hal, you're right about the Wyoming legislature and its fundamental lack of concern for wildlife. Where you seem to be missing the point is that you don't want to accept any statement about the extreme degree of control that the livestock industry wields over wildlife management in the State. Let me be clear. The ranchers run G&F;in this state. They always have. It's simply gotten worse over the last decade. The State's wolf and bear plans, for example, are pretty much Stockgrower documents.

Hal, if you'd lke to discuss this further, I'd like to. Things are truly bad in this state for wildlife, and G&F;is clearly part of the problem, rather than the solution. Write me at so we can set up a time to talk on the phone.

Best,
Robert

One more point about the livestock industry in Wyoming. Hal doesn't understand why the legislature is refusing to adequately fund wildlife management in the State. THe reason is pretty clear: rancher dominated legislatures in years past simply didn't care about wildlife, except as a cost of doing business, and that lack of concern still exists. The fact is, the rancher dominated legislature has pretty much seen G&F;as a source of subsidy rather than as the agency with the public trust responsibility for wildlife. That is the point of the Gabrielson quotation in my last post. The livestock industry has consistently pushed its costs of doing business onto the public. For example, Feedgrounds cost the hunters and anglers of Wyoming $1.5 million a year. Ranchers put not one penny into the cost of feedgrounds, even though ranchers are the beneficiaries of those feedgtounds. Another example of ranchers pushing costs onto the public is publicly funded predator control.

Over the past year, I've had a lot of coverage about the negative implications of the elk feedgrounds. This has generated many comments, but something is missing. In line with Hal's question about who supports the artificial feeding operations, I wonder why somebody, possibly somebody from the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, hasn't chimed in to defend the feedlots. Does they mean there is no defense?

Bill Schneider

Bill

Rationally and scientifically, there is no defense of feedgrounds. It's all politics. Whenever anyone from the Wyoming Game & Fish Dept. is called upon to defend the policy, you get something along these lines:

"While we understand the negative consequences of feeding elk, it is simply impossible to close them at this time. We are responding to public demand. Hunters and the tourist industry demand lots of elk. If we closed feedgrounds, numbers would fall drastically. Furthermore, the legislature requires us to pay damage claims to landowners who make claims for elk damage. Were we to close feedgrounds, we'd have elk in haystacks everywhere. We can't afford to pay those damage claims. Finally, while brucellosis is not a problem for elk, it is for the livestock industry. We need to feed elk to keep them off the cattle feedlines as well as to experiment with technical ways to control brucellosis in elk, such as elk vaccination and now test and slaughter, to protect the livestock industry from the risk of brucellosis transmission."

All of these are excuses.

1. Numbers of elk. At the same time the Dept. talks about public demand for lots of elk, the Dept. also complains from time to time that elk herds in western Wyoming are over objective, and they are. As much as 30% over objective. I would hardly call it rational management to maintain herds at numbers that are admittedly over objective.

2. Damage claims. As I said in a recent posting, feedgrounds cost the Dept. $1.5 million a year to operate; ranchers pay not one dime for their operation. The cost of feedgrounds comes out of the G&F;Fund. It is true that the legislature requires the Dept. to pay damage claims; this requirement dates back to the 1930s. Damage claims for all wildlife damage currently run between $300-500,000 a year. This was the driving factor in the Dept.'s long term strategy, begun in 1941, to purchase "marginally productive" ranches around the state, particularly in the west. That is, as did the State of Montana, the Dept. made every effort to buy winter range for elk and other wildlife. This strategy was in place for 50 years. During this time, there were the constant complaints about government ownership of land, mostly from the Stockgrowers, yet the Dept. was able to find willing sellers who didn't agree with the ideology. This stategy came to a sudden end in 1991 with a large purchase that added over 30,000 acres to the East Fork winter range complex near where I live. The Stockgrowers had a fit; bills were introduced to require all purchases to be approved by the legislature. These failed, but a bill that didn't fail was one that took authority from the G&F;Commission to appoint the Dept. Director and gave that authority to the Governor. When Jim Geringer, who as governor acted primarily as an errand boy for the big guys, was elected governor in 1994, he not only had appointment authority for Commissiners, but also the Director. He appointed individuals who were determined to privatize hunting licenses to the Commission and appointed non-entities to be Director. Because Geringer was re-elected, he had 8 years to destroy one of the finest G&F;departments in the country. And he did.

As long as the damage claim requirement remains on the books, it will be an obstacle to closing feedgrounds. Still, see below.

3. Brucellosis threat to cattle. As I said before, this is a fraud. Were brucellosis truly a threat to the livestock industry, ranchers would have made the rational decision and agreed to the closure of feedgrounds, despite short term problems of elk roaming that would result. However, they refuse to consider it. I find this clear evidence that feedgrounds don't pose a real threat to the livestock industry, that power politics is the real reason they remain open.

As in Idaho, the recent brucellosis infections in Wyoming are attributed to elk. But the facts of these infections, while partly known to the press, have yet to be reported. For example, with the first two outbreaks in Wyoming, they were attributed to the same herd owned by Doc Jensen from Boulder. Wyoming was "credited" with two outbreaks because the second outbreak was occurred in a cattle feedlot near Worland in cows from Jensen's herd. What is not known are the conditions under which the infection took place. Jensen's property is next to Muddy Feedground, where the test and slaughter program is being conducted. The FG is on Forest land, and the Forest requires all hay to be certified. G&F;was unable to buy certified hay for the 2003 season, and could buy only uncertified hay. So Jensen was talked into letting G&F;feed elk on his private property near his cattle. This replicates almost perfectly Idaho's first cattle outbreak in 2002 in Carole Albertson's herd in Conant Creek. She had been feeding elk in proxmimty to her cattle for two decades, at first with Idaho Dept. of F&G;blessing and hay. When Idaho realized the immediate risk and stopped providing hay to Ms Albertson and asked her to stop, she refused. Eventually, her herd was infected. Given this, it is simply rationally inconceivable that Jensen allowed G&F;to feed elk from Muddy Feedground on his property. But he did. I suspect something similar happened with outbreaks 3 and 4 in Teton County, although the Ag folks have been keeping the facts close hold, no doubt because they don't reflect well on the livestock industry.

There are a number of physical actions that can be taken to protect cattle feedlines and haystacks from elk that wander through private property after feedground closure, and as we saw with the North Piney FG closure experiment, it is certainly possible to change elk behavior to migrate to existing winter range out on the sagebrush flats. However, ranchers refuse because they don't want elk on existing wingter range, even public winter range. That would require a reallocation of AUMS on BLM lands from cattle to wildlife. THat's where the bottom line is.

Even G&F;admits that were elk allowed to distribute themselves across the landscape, brucellosis would eventually burn itself out of western Wyoming's elk. All it would take would be for the livestock industry to take some responsibility for protecting itself during the transition period between feedground closure and eventual brucellosis burnout in elk. Of course, the livestock industry would also have to accept fewer cattle AUM

In conclusion, G&F;makes three bogus excuses as to why feedgrounds must remain open. Each excuse can be dealt with, and would be dealtwith were in not for the intransigence and obstinance, not to mention selfishness and greed, of the livestock industry, not to mention the negligence of the G&F;Dept "leadership."

Robert

To Robert Hoskins,

Regardless of your agenda, beliefs, or personal feelings, I for one would appreciate you not making vindictive and malicious statements about the late Dr. Tom Thorne - a genuine icon in the field of wildlife diseases, a credit to Wyoming and the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, and a colleague, friend, and mentor to many people still in this state working hard everyday to protect, sustain, and conserve the wildlife of Wyoming and the Rocky Mountain west. He devoted his professional career to Wyoming and its wildlife, and your statements only reflect poorly upon yourself and your lack of knowledge on a wealth of subjects, not the least wildlife diseases, livestock diseases, zoonoses, regulatory veterinary medicine, and the people that work in these fields. If you had known Tom Thorne, you would understand that he cared less about recognition, personal reward, self glory, the spotlight, or receiving credit for work well done than any other professional in this field - he cared about results, and how they were reached or who got the credit mattered little. None of us always are right, or always have 20-20 foresight, but he did more for the wildlife of this state in an average year than the rest of us will contribute in a lifetime (you included), so please cease with the personal attacks.

Todd Cornish

To Todd Cornish

I stand by my judgment of Tom Thorne and the Wyoming G&F;Dept. Tom Thorne consistently lied to the public about his elk vaccination program and did so for years. He consistently defended elk feedgrounds when anyone with any scientific understanding of disease would know what the consequences of feedgrounds are. If you know anything about epidemiology, then you know yourself what the facts are, even if you deny them for political reasons. The fact is, people have known the facts for years and no professional biologist I know of outside the G&F;Dept supports feedgrounds or the "work" that Tom Thorne did. All the support is political, as from APHIS and the US Animal Health Association, an industry group. Thorne and G&F;'s actions during the NER lawsuit were particularly damning and deceitful.

Tom Thorne and the Wyoming Game & Fish Department kowtowed to the livestock industry for years and now the pigeons are coming home to roost with chronic wasting disease. That's NEGLIGENCE, and it was and is deliberate. If you don't care for my judgment, that's your problem.

Robert Hoskins