As Wildlife Disease Tips Scale, Sierra Club Urges WY Phase-Out Feedlots

Jackson, WY-- Late yesterday, the Wyoming Game and Fish Department announced that chronic wasting disease (CWD) was confirmed in a mule deer in the Wyoming Range mountains. The positive test signals that the always-fatal wildlife disease has officially hit an area that encompasses three entire winter elk feedgrounds: South Park, Horse Creek, and Camp Creek; and a portion of Dell Creekfeedground at Riling Draw road.  

And in Montana, a deer northeast of Billings tested positive for CWD-- marking an expansion of the area where the disease has been found in the state. For years, conservation groups have stressed that phasing out high-risk elk feedlots in Wyoming should be a crucial strategy in stopping the spread of the disease. Montana’s Fish and Wildlife Commission sent a letter to Wyoming state officials with the same ask in 2017.

In response, Lloyd Dorsey, Conservation Program Manager at the Sierra Club Wyoming Chapter, released the following statement:

“The growing danger of Chronic Wasting Disease must be treated as the crisis it is. Our outdoors economy, and our deer and elk herds, are at serious risk if Wyoming fails to change the way it currently manages wildlife. Phasing out elk feedlots-- several now surrounded by the deadly disease-- and native carnivores to restore health to natural systems remain absolutely critical in mitigating the harmful effects of this threat.

“Now more than ever, the state and federal governments need to phase out high-risk elk feedlots in Wyoming that exacerbate this disease, including ending the artificial feeding program on the National Elk Refuge, and allow wildlife to benefit from a far healthier, natural system. We must protect native carnivores-- bears, cougars, wolves and coyotes-- who are key species in disease mitigation. It's past time Wyoming end the outdated and high-risk ways they manage wildlife.”