Wyoming wildlife officials will face immense political pressure if they proceed with a plan to designate the migration corridors the Sublette Pronghorn Herd relies on to survive.

Based on the track record of Wyoming’s migration policy, it’s unclear how much effect designating the route commonly called the “Path of the Pronghorn” would have on safeguarding the acreage that tens of thousands of Green River Basin pronghorn move through seasonally.

But influential parties in Wyoming — county government, the oil and gas industry and ranching interests — have made it clear that they question or outright oppose even going as far as designating the western Wyoming route at all. The sprawling migration corridor, which treads through much of the Green River Basin, connects south from Interstate 80 all the way north to places like Bondurant and Jackson Hole.

Petroleum Association of Wyoming Regulatory Affairs Director Colin McKee was blunt when he wrote the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission. He asked the panel to drop the idea of designating the corridor, suggesting that it was a “reactionary” response to a deadly winter.

“PAW believes there is insufficient data and basis to support further review of the [Sublette Antelope migration corridor],” McKee wrote in a public comment letter.

One energy company is taking a similar tack, asking Game and Fish to scrap its plans to recognize a migration corridor that overlaps the Anticline and Jonah fields, which are two of the largest natural gas fields in the country. A third major field is in the early stages of development.

“Kirkwood questions the need for an actual designation,” wrote Steve Degenfelder, land manager for Casper-based Kirkwood Oil and Gas.

Degenfelder, the father of Wyoming Superintendent of Public Instruction Megan Degefelder, previously pressured the state to allow his company to drill in the most constricted “bottleneck” portion of the pronghorn path. Three of the five State Board of Land Commissioners — Secretary of State Chuck Gray, State Auditor Kristi Racines and Treasurer Curt Meier — OK’d that plan, tossing aside requests from two state agencies to alter Kirkwood’s lease terms. Megan Degenfelder recused herself from that vote.

Steve Degenfelder questioned the science underpinning the Game and Fish’s migration corridor proposal in his letter to commissioners. Pronghorn, he wrote, continued to use “stopover and high use areas” subject to “more [drilling] activity than the state has ever seen.” His assertion, however, doesn’t stand up to research that shows pronghorn were displaced in the Anticline Field.

State biologists believe that the migration corridors used by the Sublette Pronghorn Herd are at “high risk” of being lost due to human population growth and habitat fragmentation from industrial activity, including renewable energy development.

There are also ample voices in favor of the science and the state’s bid to maintain the Path of the Pronghorn. A half-dozen hunting groups active in Wyoming wrote in support.

“Designation of the Sublette pronghorn migration corridor comes at an important time,” representatives for the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, Wyoming Wildlife Federation, Muley Fanatic Foundation, Backcountry Hunters and Anglers, Mule Deer Foundation and American Bear Foundation wrote.

“The harsh winter of 2022-2023 proved to be devastating for the herd which suffered a massive die-off of 75 percent of collared does which was exacerbated by an outbreak of Mycoplasma bovis,” the groups added. “We know that pronghorn who were able to migrate further south to lower elevations had lower mortality rates, a clear indication of the importance of landscape permeability for ensuring the future of this herd.”

The vast majority of individuals who submitted comments to Game and Fish also supported Wyoming taking a step toward protection. So did the superintendent of Grand Teton National Park, where a subpopulation of the Sublette Herd spends the summer.

State officials will have to weigh those sentiments with those of more skeptical parties, like the Sublette County Board of Commissioners. Sam White, who chairs the commission, suggested that the state revise its migration policy to “give protection to industries.”

Notably, the Sublette Pronghorn corridor would be the first designated under the protocol prescribed in the state’s migration policy. It’s gone unused since 2019, when the state pressed pause at the urging of industry groups, and then subsequently overhauled the policy so that it’s under the governor and not solely the Wyoming Game and Fish Department.

While many of the same voices are still contesting using the policy to protect wildlife migration, others have taken a different tone. Jim Magagna, the longtime executive vice president for the Wyoming Stockgrowers Association, wrote that his organization supports moving toward designation — at least in areas.

“The primary corridor originating near Grand Teton National Park and stretching to Highway 28 west of Farson faces unique challenges from energy development and subdivisions,” Magagna wrote. “This corridor should be the focus of consideration for designation.”

Magagna was less enthused about designating two distinct shorter corridors east of Highway 191 along the foot of the Wind River Range, where there’s less energy development and nearer to where his sheep ranching operations occur.

One person who wrote emphatically in support of designating the Sublette Pronghorn Herd’s migration paths was John Fandek, a longtime Game and Fish elk feeder. Fandek criticized industry contentions — since parroted by some media outlets — that oil and gas infrastructure could somehow be beneficial to wildlife like pronghorn, sheltering them from winter storms.

“This is the kind of shallow, self-serving thinking that allows some people to believe that no matter what obstacles — industrial development, increased traffic, endless subdivisions, more people — that we place in their way, wildlife will adapt and will always be there,” Fandek wrote.

“Looking at other over-populated and industrialized landscapes tells a different story. The time is now to give more consideration to the wealth of wildlife remaining here in Sublette County.”

WyoFile is an independent nonprofit news organization focused on Wyoming people, places and policy.