Jackson Hole news | Jackson Hole feature | Jackson Hole environmental | Jackson Hole sports | Today's News

Elk feeding faces fight

Conservation groups target Forest Service feed grounds, threaten suit.

By Rebecca Huntington

Conservation groups are challenging the state's practice of feeding elk by threatening to sue federal managers, who allow the activity on public lands.

Conservationists say the federal government has failed to adequately review the environmental impacts of permitting elk feeding at 15 feed grounds on the Bridger-Teton National Forest and Bureau of Land Management parcels around Pinedale. The letter also challenges a test and slaughter pilot program slated for the Muddy Creek feed ground in Sublette County this winter.

In a letter made public Monday, the groups say they'll sue if the Forest Service and BLM don't address their concerns. (See sidebar, page 37A.)

The letter argues that the state elk feeding program creates Petri-dish-like conditions by artificially concentrating wildlife, perfect for transmitting diseases that put elk herds at risk.

"All of us are frustrated with this process, and we don't contemplate taking legal action lightly," said Franz Camenzind, executive director of the Jackson Hole Conservation Alliance, one of three groups represented by the environmental firm Earthjustice, which wrote the letter. The Greater Yellowstone Coalition and Wyoming Outdoor Council are the other groups backing the letter.

The groups have exhausted other avenues and are moving toward legal action because they fear an outbreak of chronic wasting disease, which is fatal, could devastate elk on feed grounds, according to the groups.

"Maybe this will turn the ship a few degrees [so] we can avoid the iceberg," Camenzind said Tuesday.

The Forest Service and BLM have responded by saying the feeding question is outside the scope of their agencies and rests instead with the Wyoming Game and Fish Department. Game and Fish officials, meanwhile, said the state will examine the feeding question on a herd-by-herd basis as the state prepares action management plans for each elk herd that winters on feed grounds.

Issue has been in federal courts before

This is not the first time the question of elk feeding has been pulled into the federal courts. In 1997, the animal rights activist group Fund for Animals sued the federal government over a planned bison hunt on the National Elk Refuge.

The Fund argued that the government could not authorize hunting to control bison numbers without first conducting an environmental analysis of how feeding both elk and bison on the refuge affects bison numbers. A federal judge sided with the Fund, triggering a multiyear, multimillion dollar study of elk and bison feeding on the refuge. Refuge officials released a draft of the study this summer. Bison hunting on the refuge, meanwhile, has been put on hold, allowing the bison herd to grow to around 800 animals.

The prospect of a similar court fight over state-run feed grounds has drawn the ire of one sportsmen's group, which disagrees with conservationists over the risks of CWD and adamantly supports elk feeding.

"I just think it's kind of a joke," said Bob Wharff of Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife Wyoming. "It's just going to waste a bunch of money and time."

Other observers worry that a possible suit might just move state feeding from federal lands to state and private parcels. Feed ground supporters say phasing out feeding would reduce elk numbers more than a disease outbreak. Conservationists disagree, saying diseases, such as CWD, would be more devastating.

Bridger-Teton Deputy Supervisor Brent Larson agrees with conservationists that phasing out feed grounds would be the best way to combat wildlife diseases.

"I couldn't agree with them more that ultimately that would be the best possible solution," Larson said Tuesday.

Nonetheless, there are economic, social and political pressures that make closing feed grounds a tough proposition, he said. The governor appointed a task force last year of ranchers, hunters, disease experts and others to examine the question of elk feed grounds and disease. It recommended against phasing out feed grounds.

Some ranchers and hunters adamantly opposed phasing out feed grounds, arguing that it would reduce elk numbers and encourage commingling of wildlife and livestock, which could spread diseases such as brucellosis, to cattle. Other group members, however, including several veterinarians, submitted a minority opinion recommending a feed ground phaseout.

Larson served as a technical adviser to that group and said task force members looked at the best science available and weighed it against political, social and economic concerns.

"Quite honestly, when it gets into this kind of arena, it's not science that typically answers those questions, it's the social-political realities," Larson said.

That debate aside, Larson disagrees with conservationists that such decisions rest with the Forest Service.

The Bridger-Teton permits the structures that sit on the forest, such as corrals and hay sheds, which are used in feeding operations. But the Forest Service does not have authority to manage wildlife, he said.

"We permit the facilities on the forest ­ the act of feeding is a state responsibility," Larson said.

Likewise, BLM spokesman Steven Hall said the question of feeding is outside the scope of his agency's authority.

"The decision to feed elk rests with Game and Fish," Hall said.

In response to the Earthjustice letter, BLM officials reviewed the environmental analysis that has been done to date and concluded that it's sufficient to allow feed ground facilities on BLM lands.

Earthjustice: Agency has blinders on

Earthjustice attorney Tim Preso disagreed with what he called a "cramped" interpretation of the federal agencies' authorities.

"They've, I think, improperly tried to put on blinders and said, 'We're just authorizing the corral and the hay barn,'" Preso responded. "The law does not permit the agency to put on blinders like that."

The National Environmental Policy Act requires the Forest Service and BLM to study the environmental impacts that flow from their decisions, which includes allowing feeding, Preso said.

The Forest Service disagrees with Earthjustice about the level of environmental analysis that's necessary. From a practical perspective, Larson said, "we can spend a million dollars and go do an [environmental impact statement], and I'm not exactly sure what it will resolve."

In addition to challenging the practice of feeding, the Earthjustice letter takes the Forest Service to task for allowing a 1.8-mile fence and pilot test and slaughter program on the Muddy Creek feed ground.

The Forest Service is allowing the fence and the installation of the "mother of all traps" for test and slaughter purposes with no environmental review or public comment, the letter argues.

Larson responded that Game and Fish reviewed the environmental impacts of the fence to ensure migrating wildlife would not be harmed. As for the massive trap, the structure is temporary and sits within an area the state has historically used for feeding.

Preso countered that the facility is going to be used for "a wholly new purpose," which requires a more thorough review.

Camenzind also questioned the potential impacts of slaughtering up to 10 percent of the Pinedale elk herd if those animals test positive for brucellosis. The governor's task force approved the pilot project, which begins this winter, to see whether test and slaughter could reduce the infection rate of brucellosis among feed ground elk.

Reducing infection rates could be a first step toward phasing out feed grounds, Larson said.

But Camenzind said the test and slaughter program would continue to concentrate elk, perpetuating disease and inviting a possible "epidemic of CWD."

"That scares me," Camenzind said. "I would rather face the unpopular consequences of an angry segment of the public than to think 10 years from now we didn't do the right thing after CWD has come in and devastated our elk herds."