Across Wyoming are set some of the nation's most dramatic scenery and most impressive wildlife concentrations. Yellowstone National Park, the Jackson Hole country, the Wind River Range, the Bighorn Mountains: These places are emblems of the American west. Today's American west, though, is also an arena of contentious conservation issues. Wyoming has its share of those, too, from snowmobiles, to gray wolves, to destructive energy policy.
Wyoming Range Lease Sale Placed on Hold
The Wyoming Range, located within the Bridger-Teton National Forest, is known for its incredible wildlife and outstanding recreational values. This area is also prized by the oil and gas industry, which will be drilling up to 10,000 oil and gas wells in the nearby Upper Green River Valley in the next few years. Thanks to an appeal brought by The Wilderness Society, an oil and gas lease sale in the Wyoming Range has been placed on “hold,” opening an opportunity for permanent protection of this cherished area.
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Energy Development Threatens Upper Green River Valley Wildlife Haven
Nestled between Greater Yellowstone's high peaks and the Red Desert's colorful badlands and sand dunes is the Upper Green River Valley, the largest publicly owned block of wildlife winter range in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. These lands also comprise the longest big-game migration route in the lower 48 states and are one of the last strongholds for sage grouse, an icon of the prairie now in trouble across most of its range. Energy development on the scale contemplated will destroy all of that.
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Yellowstone to Yukon: A Bold Vision
From Yellowstone National Park to the Yukon Territory, the Rocky Mountains are one of the world's most loved and celebrated mountain ranges. Both the U.S. and Canadian national park systems were born there. Conservationists from both nations have come together to protect this unique mountain ecosystem, its wildlife and the quality of life of its people.
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Wyoming Wilderness
Some of the loveliest country in the lower 48 states is found in 3.1 million acres of designated wilderness in Wyoming. Concerned citizens and conservation groups have identified another 5 million acres of potential wilderness on our public lands there. They are now working through the Bureau of Land Management's planning process and the U.S. Forest Service's forest plan revisions across the state to ensure that the agencies recognize the candidate wildlands and develop management frameworks that will protect irreplaceable wilderness values.
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The Red Desert and Wild Heart of the West
Even in Wyoming, with its bounties of beauty and wildlife, the Red Desert is remarkable. Like dozens of other places on our public lands across the American West today, though, the Red Desert is a target for oil and gas development.
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