March 2022 - 16

IN THE FIELD
A ribbon-cutting ceremony took place last year at the Willett Drive Parking area in Laramie which is one of the western access points to the Pilot Hill Wildlife Management Area. Left to right: Laramie Parks,
Trees & Recreation Advisory Board chair Larry Foianini, University of Wyoming President Edward Seidel, Pilot Hill Board Chair Anthony Hoch, Albany County Commissioner Sue Ibarra, Wyoming Game and Fish
Department Habitat and Access Biologist Micah Morris, Wyoming Conservation Corps Director Jim Fried and President and CEO of Trihydro Corp. Kurt Tuggle. (Photo by Micah Morris/WGFD)
New WHMA provides
diversity in Laramie Region
The Pilot Hill property was purchased in the fall of 2020
By Micah Morris
In the fall of 2020 the Wyoming Game and
Fish Commission approved a commitment to
manage 3,076 acres and create a new wildlife
habitat management area within the Pilot Hill
land project east of Laramie.
Pilot Hill is a community-driven effort that
worked collaboratively with the Office of State
Lands and Investments and Albany County
to acquire 7,086 acres of land for recreation,
habitat conservation and aquifer protection.
The new Commission lease has created an
additional WHMA in Albany County that
provides critical habitat for elk, mule deer,
pronghorn and numerous nongame species
of greatest conservation need.
The WHMA is made up of two areas and
connects more than 65,000 acres of U.S.
16 | March 2022
Forest Service and state lands. One area is a
recreation corridor of approximately 4,010
acres with miles of planned recreational trails.
The second is the crucial wildlife habitat
portion with limited trail development. The
WHMA is closed to human presence Feb.
1-April 30 each year to minimize disturbance
to wintering wildlife. It reopens to the public
at 8 a.m. May 1.
The property safeguards a vital piece of a
critical aquifer resource and preserves a unique
landscape as open space for recreation, education
and wildlife habitat. The landscape
boasts a vast array of wildlife from big game
to nongame and habitat ranging from forests,
gorges and valleys.
" The collaborative management of this
property is unique, and we're glad to have a
role in protecting this important habitat for
wildlife as well as being able to offer hunters
more access opportunities in southeast Wyoming, "
Game and Fish Commission President
Pete Dube said.
During the 2020 and 2021 field seasons,
the Wyoming Game and Fish Department's
habitat and access crew made several upgrades
to the WHMA. The crew signed the perimeter
with habitat area boundary signs every quarter
mile of the boundary. It installed public land
access informational signs at several entrance
locations, including three forest service access
points located on the eastern portion and
two on the western portion. The public land
information signs not only provide a map,
but list the regulations and requirements of
the WHMA. The crew also created a shooting
buffer, which informs the public with signs
of the residential community that lies along

March 2022

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of March 2022