Mineral extraction is an important part of Wyoming’s economy and its continued benefits to the state cannot be ignored. It is possible, however, to conduct balanced and responsible energy development in areas that will not negatively impact other Wyoming businesses, including tourism, ranching, outfitting and recreation.
Energy development in the Wyoming Range has occurred since the early 1960’s and more recently in the 1980’s with the Forest Service approval of the Riley Ridge project and more than 230 natural gas wells in this area. Oil and gas companies already hold leases on 150,587 acres in the Wyoming Range, most of them in the northern roadless core of the range. In 2005, the Forest Service announced its intent to lease an additional 44,600 acres in new areas of the range. This decision puts at risk our world-class scenery, recreation and wildlife habitat, west of Merna, a major access point and a prized recreation corridor.
The Future is Uncertain
The Bridger-Teton National Forest is revising its land-use plan, which will guide management of the Wyoming Range and nearby mountain ranges. Now is the time to speak up to demand protection for this special landscape. In the works are plans for additional oil and gas leasing across the range, new exploratory wildcat wells in the Upper Hoback River drainage and a proposed coalbed methane project in the southern foothills.
All Is Not Well In Paradise
In the last half decade, our nation’s appetite for oil and gas has opened up crucial chunks of mule deer winter range to development, carving roads onto sagebrush-cloaked ridges and eating up thousands of acres of critical wildlife habitat with drill pads, holding tanks, reserve pits and other 
infrastructure. Human activity, from workers at well sites, to eighteen wheelers on new roads, has caused significant damage to this famed mule deer herd, cutting the herd by half according to a study completed by Hall Sawyer, West, Inc., 2005. Today, the unprecedented development on mule deer winter range at the toe of the mountains will negatively impact tomorrow’s mule deer hunter. A large portion of the famous Sublette mule deer herd summers on the Wyoming Range; development in the high country hammers big game during a crucial time when they need to be storing fat for the upcoming winter season. Industrial development in both summer and winter ranges is a sure recipe for the end of a world-renowned sporting legacy. The opportunity to shoot a wall-hanger buck during hunting season is being lost because the country where that buck once spent his winter and his summer now is an inhospitable industrial development. Unfortunately, the hunting for both mule deer and elk will likely never recover, at least in the lifetimes of our grandchildren.
Feeding our nation’s appetite for oil and gas is an important factor in Wyoming’s economy. But 
some places should simply be off limits to such development. One of those places is the Wyoming Range. Yet despite the fact that the Wyoming Range is an outdoors haven for all kinds of recreationists, the U.S. Forest Service still wants to open large chunks of the range up to development. Already, some 150,000 acres of the range have been leased for oil and gas development. An additional 44,600 acres has been leased in 2005 and 2006 on the eastern edge of the range.
Oil and gas development means new roads into pristine country. It means drill pads in the headwaters of some of the most pristine streams in the state. It means big rigs, human disturbance and industrial impact. It means the end of traditional ways of making a living in the range: from outfitting, to our hunting and fishing heritage, to ranching, to local businesses that make a living from our outdoor resources.
