Most of us bring a healthy dose of personal bias to the opinion section. I’ll admit mine up front: Wyoming’s bountiful wildlife is why I live and raise my kids here, but it can slip away if we take it for granted.  Opinion Wyoming used to have more pronghorn than people — a real poin t of pride for many of us. Those days are gone, but we can protect what we have left with Wyoming’s migration corridor executive order. That’s why I’m writing in favor of conserving the Sublette pronghorn migration corridor as the state gathers input through May 2. I’d like nothing more than to see our Game and Fish Commission recommend designation to Gov. Mark Gordon because I want future generations to experience the same awe-inspiring wildlife I have. That’s my take.  But one affected party acts without any bias at all: The pronghorn themselves. For more than 20 years, pronghorn in the Sublette herd have been studied intensively, becoming one of the most scrutinized ungulate populations in the world. Across the length and breadth of Wyoming’s Green River Valley, biologists have captured and collared hundreds of animals with GPS trackers, logging hundreds of thousands of data points to gain insight into how pronghorn use the landscape.  The detailed picture that’s emerged tells the tale of Wyoming’s longest pronghorn migration. We can trace the pathways pronghorn use to access summer forage and escape harsh winter conditions. We can see the tiny bottlenecks animals must pass through to reach vital habitat and visualize how, over time, ill-placed infrastructure displaces pronghorn from their native ranges. Their responses to habitat fragmentation, fences, and invasive species aren’t in service of an ideology. They travel where they need to go to survive, pure and simple. The map we’re left with can serve as a blueprint for sustaining this massive population of pronghorn, if we can muster the willpower to use it.  Wyoming has done this before. Migration corridors for the Sublette, Platte Valley and Baggs mule deer herds were designated in 2020. Mapping bottleneck, stopover, and high use areas in these corridors signaled a strong commitment from the state to conserve migratory habitat and opened the door for targeted management actions and funding to do so. Now, designation helps guide new development away from the most highly trafficked portions of these migration corridors, clearly mapped out for all to see, while allowing multiple use of public and state land to proceed without irreparably damaging connectivity.  We’ve seen firsthand that designation doesn’t keep businesses or industry from making profits, but it does make it easier for our biologists to manage wildlife sustainably, in trust for the public. It’s a system that’s been working for people and mule deer for over five years. Given heavy losses the Sublette Pronghorn herd sustained two winters ago when the population was nearly halved by punishing snow and cold, designation can’t come soon enough. The forces making it harder for these animals to migrate are relentless and growing, yet population recovery can only occur if linkages between seasonal habitats remain open and passable. Likewise, if we want pronghorn to have a shot at surviving the next big winter that comes our way, the ability to migrate off the high plains to more temperate winter ranges is a must. Designation would give Wyoming the framework it needs to keep these essential pathways open, supporting long-term viability for one the world’s biggest pronghorn herds. They may have been unaware of the information they were relaying, but with every trip to and from summer range, GPS-collared animals in the Sublette Pronghorn herd made plain what habitat is indispensable for migration. Their needs are unambiguous and unclouded by any motivation beyond basic survival. The Wyoming Game and Fish Commission and the governor have a golden opportunity to harness this information, designate this corridor and ensure we don’t lose the state’s longest pronghorn migration. Let’s trust what the pronghorn are telling us and make it happen. The post Trust the data, trust the pronghorn: Now’s the time for corridor designation appeared first on WyoFile . ...read more read less