My Page: Shauna Stephenson

New West Feature

A suite of habitat stressors appears to have caused a massive decline in mule deer and pronghorn herds around the border of Wyoming and Colorado, according to a recent National Wildlife Federation (NWF) report.

The herds, which tend to migrate back and forth over state lines, have encountered a number of pressures over the past 30 years, including fragmentation of habitat, disease, energy development, drought, and harsh winters.

New West Feature

While the nationwide trend of children spending time outdoors seems to be on a gradual decline, Wyoming shows some tentative promise.

A statewide study (PDF), conducted by the University of Wyoming Survey and Analysis Center, shows that Wyoming children spent almost twice the amount of time outside in August 2010 (3.7 hours a day) in comparison to the national average (two hours).

The survey found that most time spent outside was at home in the yard or neighborhood, doing chores, playing or participating in outdoor sports. But close behind were the 67 percent of kids who spent time in local parks. Also on the list were backpacking, hiking, camping, snow recreation, fishing, hunting, trapping and tracking.

The question of why Wyoming kids are so far ahead of the national average is more complicated to explain.

“We don’t really know all the reasons,” says Wyoming Gov. Matt Mead.

New West Essay

It’s 6:30 in the morning and the mixer is already going in my kitchen.

Somewhere over the course of the last year, my husband, Cole, has developed a fanatical obsession to make the best pizza… ever. His words, not mine. Pretty soon he was that dude sniffing pizza crusts in the corner of restaurants, the guy Googling ways to jerry-rig the oven so he could get it up to 800 degrees.

Flour flies all over the counter as he prepares the next batch of dough.

On any given day, we have multiple cultures of yeast growing in a Styrofoam cooler rigged with heat lamp and meat thermometer – his homemade thermo-regulated container. At some point sweet basil will be clipped from the pots that sit at our living room window. Sauce will be made, and crust will brown on a searing hot pizza stone.

Never being one to turn down a meal, I have done nothing but encourage this behavior, joining the conversations on the attributes of various kinds of cheese. This is the kind of talk that makes more intelligent people glaze over with boredom. 

New West Feature

The shorter season gives ungulates less time to build the necessary fat reserves that get them through harsh winters. Additionally, it may help to explain why elk numbers are sagging in the area, says Arthur Middleton, a Ph.D. student based in the Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit at the University of Wyoming and coordinator of the Absaroka Elk Ecology Project.

“The way I think about it,” Middleton says, “and maybe the best way to put it pretty bluntly, is summer is when these animals make their living. That’s when they gain all the fat that we’re worried about them losing too quickly in the winter. If they’re not gaining as much as they need or could, (winter) doesn’t matter. The relative importance of what goes on in winter is lessened.”

NEW WEST FEATURE

An agreement struck between private citizens and a Texas-based oil and gas company looking to drill on public land in Wyoming may become a model for other environmentally sensitive areas facing increased drilling across the Rocky Mountain West.

While many pieces remain undecided in the proposal to develop 136 wells in the Wyoming Range west of Pinedale, Wyoming, it appears similar agreements reached between private parties—and outside of the public process for approving oil and gas drilling— are becoming more common.

These deals, often struck between conservation groups and industry, do not replace the federally mandated public review process, which requires companies interested in drilling on public land to submit a plan to federal agencies like the U.S. Forest Service or the Bureau of Land Management. That plan is then evaluated and tweaked through a series of studies, reports and public comments to fit the land and wildlife, as well as users such as wildlife advocates, hunters, ranchers or recreationists.

Gas and Oil Development

Tests are conducted by trained volunteers who take the sample and ship it off to one of several labs that have been vetted by the group. “The lab must be nationally certified,” Ruggierro says. “This means that the lab must (meet) the national testing lab criteria, so they have been certified, by the Feds as well as their respective state.”

Ruggierro says the group’s goal is not litigation. But if landowners decide that’s the route they want to take, he wants their tests to stand up in court.

“We are not opposed to drilling,” he says. “We are, obviously, opposed to being poisoned.”

Testing for air and water typically runs in the $700 to $900 range per test, although other contingencies such as labor, mileage and tech fees can be thrown in – costs Shaletest hopes to help cover. Currently, the group is focusing on environmental monitoring, but they hope to be able to test livestock and people for chemicals in the future. Those tests can cost thousands of dollars and are typically not covered by insurance.

NEW WEST FEATURE

Wyoming outfitters and sportsmen announced Friday that they had come to a private agreement with an energy company looking to develop environmentally sensitive areas of the Wyoming Range on the Bridger-Teton National Forest.

The agreement overshadowed the newly released draft environmental impact statement (DEIS), a long anticipated document that outlined possible options for developing 136 wells in the area. The Wyoming Range, located west of Pinedale, has been a contentious issue for conservation and sportsmen’s groups for the better part of a decade now, as energy companies have announced plans to develop leases.

NEW WEST FEATURE

NEW WEST FEATURES

Over the first week of November, the tiny mind-your-own-business-and-I’ll-mind mine town of Elk Mountain was pushed into the state spotlight after coming to a tie in the mayoral elections. The community of fewer than 200 residents became a political hotbed overnight with 51 votes for the incumbent mayor, Rick Christopherson, and 51 votes for the challenger, Morgan Irene. (Two write-in candidates also received a few votes.)

In Wyoming, the only way to settle such an outcome is to draw lots – literally, to flip a coin or pull a name out of a hat to determine the next in power.

However, upon re-examining the ballots, the county clerk found one voter did not live within the town boundaries and therefore could not vote for mayor. So the whole election was declared void, and voters are being sent back to the polls on Tuesday, Nov. 23.

NEW WEST FEATURE

When it comes to the disagreements over mule deer on Wyoming’s Pinedale Anticline, common ground is in short supply and emotions are high over this intensely developed patch of land. A new report about the herd’s decline has caused no shortage of head butting.

The report released in late October, has wildlife managers looking for the next level of mitigation, trying to help a mule deer population that appears to be hemorrhaging. The herd on the Mesa had declined 60 percent since development began in 2001, and 28 percent since 2005, according to the report.

Survival rates are also down on the plateau. In the past, Mesa survival rates for adult does had been about 80 percent. This year they dropped to 70 percent, indicating that does coming off the winter range were in much poorer condition than usual.

The population decreases will force wildlife managers to step up mitigation efforts and explore new measures to maintain or increase the mule deer population, according to a Bureau of Land Management environmental impact Record of Decision from 2008.