{"id":157585,"date":"2025-09-15T04:01:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-15T04:01:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/157585\/"},"modified":"2025-09-15T04:01:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-15T04:01:09","slug":"game-and-fish-commission-reverses-plan-to-trim-wyomings-first-pronghorn-migration-corridor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/157585\/","title":{"rendered":"Game and Fish Commission reverses plan to trim Wyoming\u2019s first pronghorn migration corridor"},"content":{"rendered":"

by\u00a0Mike Koshmrl<\/a>, WyoFile<\/a><\/p>\n

After a four-hour discussion about nixing protections for two portions of a famous pronghorn migration that weaves across the Green River Basin, the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission reversed course to formally designate the route in its entirety.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWith 20 years of science, data and the vast support of the public, I believe this should move forward to the next stage,\u201d Commissioner Ken Roberts, who made the motion, said at Wednesday\u2019s meeting in Lander.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the moment, the court clerk from Kemmerer didn\u2019t say much about why he wasn\u2019t going with Game and Fish\u2019s\u00a0recommendation to not designate two of the 10 segments<\/a>\u00a0of the Sublette Pronghorn Herd\u2019s migration. That had come much earlier. Roberts jumped in to share his doubts shortly after the Wyoming Game and Fish Department\u2019s Jill Randall and Martin Hicks presented their agency\u2019s proposal.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t see where it hurts anybody,\u201d Roberts said of leaving the migration intact. \u201cI\u2019m just kind of mystified.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"\/Game and Fish Commissioner Ken Roberts discusses pronghorn during a September 2025 meeting in Lander. (Mike Koshmrl\/WyoFile)<\/p>\n

Hicks, the state\u2019s deputy chief of wildlife, reasoned the threats to pronghorn moving through the Red Desert and \u201cEast of Farson\u201d segments didn\u2019t rise to a level that warranted protection under Wyoming\u2019s policy, which is being taken for its first spin nearly\u00a0six years<\/a>\u00a0after it was revamped\u00a0in response to industry concerns<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no bottlenecks, and the threat levels were limited \u2014 that, to us, precluded designation,\u201d Hicks said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He also explained there was a lack of \u201chigh-use\u201d habitat in the two segments. That\u2019s the designation for areas used by greater than 20% of collared pronghorn.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But there was another unspoken factor at play that partly explained why Roberts was skeptical and why most seats were filled for hours at the Lander Community and Convention Center.<\/p>\n

The Wyoming Stock Growers Association\u2019s lobbyist, Jim Magagna,\u00a0renowned for his influence<\/a>\u00a0in Wyoming politics, has a ranch in the vicinity, and\u00a0he\u2019d asked that the two segments be removed<\/a>, while also noting that his land and grazing lease locations had nothing to do with the request.<\/p>\n

\"\"Jim Magagna, executive vice president of the Wyoming Stock Growers Association, explains his position about pronghorn migration corridors at a September 2025 Wyoming Game and Fish Commission meeting in Lander. (Mike Koshmrl\/WyoFile)<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, Maganga told commissioners his concern with including the two segments had to do with the sheer size of the migration corridor \u2014 at 2.6 million acres, it\u2019s larger than Yellowstone National Park.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s going to build opposition to the whole concept of the executive order,\u201d Magagna said. \u201cIt\u2019s the lumping of everything together, that is our major concern.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

There were other concerns aired as well. Oil and gas industry representatives shared doubts about the need to advance a new layer of habitat protection for a migration path that\u00a0cuts across the Pinedale Anticline<\/a>, Jonah and\u00a0Normally Pressured Lance gas fields<\/a>. Steve Degenfelder, a Casper-based landman for Kirkwood Oil and Gas, told the governor-appointed commission that the Anticline alone had generated $2.75 billion in education funding.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Landman Steve Degenfelder, of Kirkwood Oil and Gas, details his opposition to designating a pronghorn migration corridor in the energy-rich Green River Basin at a September 2025 meeting in Lander. (Mike Koshmrl)<\/p>\n

\u201cTwelve-thousand, eight hundred and sixty-five Wyoming students had their entire K-12 education made by one project,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Repeatedly through the morning, commissioner John Masterson asked commenters for input on how the Game and Fish Commission should balance its mission \u2014 \u201cconserving wildlife and serving people\u201d \u2014 with \u201cperfectly legitimate\u201d social and political considerations. The question was posed to Degenfelder, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour initiative should be towards wildlife,\u201d Degenfelder said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The sentiment was a theme of almost all the other public comments. Retired biologists, recreational hunters and bunches of professional conservationists had a unified message in urging the seven-person commission to designate all 10 segments of the Sublette Pronghorn Migration. It\u2019s among the largest and the best studied pronghorn populations in the world, and Brock Wahl of the North American Pronghorn Foundation worried about the repercussions of inaction or getting the designation wrong.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we can\u2019t get it right in this particular instance,\u201d he told commissioners, \u201cI feel as if it sets a very bad precedent for anything going forward.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"\/Wyoming ecologist Hall Sawyer fits a tracking collar onto a migratory pronghorn near the Tetons in 1998. Twenty-seven years later, state wildlife managers are pressing to designate the pronghorn herd\u2019s migration path. (Mark Gocke\/Wyoming Game and Fish Department)<\/p>\n

Meghan Riley of the Wyoming Outdoor Council emphasized the sheer number of pronghorn migrating through the segments at risk of being axed. There are about 5,000, she said, far more than traverse the famous Path of the Pronghorn and punch through all the way to Jackson Hole.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt would be a mistake to discount the significance of this segment to the population as a whole,\u201d Riley said. \u201cAccessing summer range matters to animals\u2019 survival just the same, whether that animal travels 165 miles or 30 miles.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Todd Guenther, a Lander archaeologist, joined the chorus in calling for the commission to designate the entire migration. Pronghorn are \u201cfragile,\u201d he said, and in need of \u201cproactive\u201d care.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cToo many times over my life, since I was a kid, wildlife [has] become a sacrificial lamb for different types of development projects,\u201d Guenther said. \u201cWe\u2019re running out of opportunities to preserve these different forms of wildlife.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"\/The Wyoming Game and Fish Department\u2019s plan to not designate two southeast segments of the Sublette Pronghorn Herd\u2019s migration corridor, illustrated in this map, was denied by its commission at a September 2025 meeting in Lander. (WGFD)<\/p>\n

Because of housing sprawl and industrial development, Sublette Pronghorn Herd\u2019s migrations\u00a0are at \u201chigh risk\u201d of being lost<\/a>, according to an earlier Game and Fish analysis. In a later phase of the years-long process, the public came out in strong support of taking action and deploying Wyoming\u2019s migration policy for the first time. Nearly 99% of the 530 comments the state agency received asked for designation, according to data Randall, with Game and Fish, presented in the meeting.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Game and Fish Commissioner Rusty Bell, of Gillette, cited the volume of public support as he explained why he was supporting Roberts\u2019 motion to designate all 10 migratory segments used by the Sublette Pronghorn Herd.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI think people want to see designation,\u201d Bell said. \u201cI\u2019m going to go along with what the people have said.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unanimously, the other six commissioners made the same call. The Game and Fish Commission\u2019s decision to buck its department\u2019s proposal was \u201cnot unexpected,\u201d Magagna told WyoFile after the vote.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI respect their decision,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ll go along to the next step and be engaged there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Next up in Wyoming\u2019s labyrinthine designation process, Game and Fish\u2019s migration proposal will go to Gov. Mark Gordon. If the governor finds it favorable, he\u2019ll then appoint an \u201carea working group\u201d to review the migration. That will include representatives for each county that the corridor cuts through and a number of stakeholders \u2014 at least two will represent agriculture.<\/p>\n

This article was originally published by\u00a0WyoFile<\/a>\u00a0and is republished here with permission.\u00a0WyoFile<\/a>\u00a0is an independent nonprofit news organization focused on Wyoming people, places and policy.<\/p>\n

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