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Michael P. Ramirez

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Cowboy State Daily is Wyoming’s largest newspaper with Wyoming’s most experienced journalists. 

<title>Daily Cartoon: Thursday, November 10, 2022 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Daily Cartoon: Thursday, November 10, 2022

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily reporter, Jackie Dorothy.

Jackie Dorothy

Wildlife

Summer is Wyoming’s season for turning over rocks, poking into holes and walking with a perpetual hunch looking for snakes.

Herpalogists, the zoologists who study amphibians and reptiles, are out scouring the landscape and herping, the term used when they are actively flipping rocks and searching stream beds to find Wyoming's elusive snakes in their native habitats.

Sometimes those finds can be unexpected. The fork-tongued reptiles appear on a trail when least expected. 

Recently, a foot-long “nightcrawler” suddenly moved like a snake and slithered into the rocks, its tail disappearing into the shadows. Rather than a shapeshifter, this was an elusive rubber boa, Wyoming’s tiny constrictor snake that can look like a giant worm at first glance.

These rarely seen creatures are more common in the Cowboy State than most people realize.

“I personally don't feel that any of our snakes in Wyoming are terribly rare,” said Matt Rasmussen, vice president of the 

. “However, a lot of them are very rarely encountered because they spend most of their lives either underground or under rocks.”

Rasmussen said most of the secretive snakes in Wyoming only come out at night or when conditions are right — typically warmer, humid times. The rubber boa, for instance, showed up on a day when it had rained and then the temperatures spiked hot.

Rasmussen helped found the new Herpetological Society two years ago to teach others to herp. He said it’s possible to learn more about our state by flipping rocks and seeing what is beneath.

“That's the great thing with Wyoming,” Rasmussen said. “There is so little known about the herpetofauna — the frogs, lizards, snakes, turtles, etcetera — that live here, and so little known about their distribution.”

He said Wyoming is known for “large charismatic megafauna” such as bison, elk, moose and deer rather than the harder to find animals. As a result, no widespread surveying has been done on smaller non-game species. Wyoming Game and Fish has even asked for community members to help by reporting  rarely seen reptiles and amphibians.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Elusive, Not Rare"}]

While most people think of the more common bullsnake or venomous rattlesnake when discussing reptiles, Rasmussen said Wyoming is home to many harmless snakes.

According to Rasmussen, a few snakes, such as the colorful pale milk snake and rubber boa, could be considered rare in Wyoming. However, he believes they are just harder to find and most people are not aware of them unless they stumble across them.

“There’s the plains black-headed snake, which we really don't know much about their distribution in Wyoming,” Rasmussen said. “They're just not studied and have a limited habitat.”

This tan snake with a black head is small and feeds primarily on centipedes and ant eggs. Rasmussen cautions that when found, rather than kill the strange looking snakes that are harmless, report finding them to Wyoming Game and Fish and leave them in their habitat.

In this way, Rasmussen said, herping can be fun. He encourages people to get into the action.

“There are some other really small fossorial snakes like smooth green snakes, which live along creeks in the mountains and eat caterpillars and spiders,” Rasmussen said. “Then there's the Black Hills red-bellied snake, which is a very small snake that eats slugs, worms and snails primarily.”

People are often surprised that Wyoming is home to such a large variety of snakes. He especially likes to show off a milk snake, which is harmless and eats lizards and even baby rattlesnakes.

“It is a beautiful, almost tropical-looking animal that lives right here,” Rasmussen said. “They are just rarely encountered.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"A New Snake & Frog Society"}]

Rasmussen said the new society is trying to educate the community about these fascinating creatures in the Cowboy State that don't get much attention, such as the skink, a short-legged lizard. 

“We're a group of herpetological enthusiasts who would like to spread the word, educate and do outreach about these animals,” he said.

This outreach includes presentations with live animals, field trips and a conference in November. Wyoming’s reptiles and amphibians remain a mystery, Rasmussen encourages reporting sightings on the app 

“Even if you don't know what it is, post a picture because there are tens of thousands of experts who will identify that animal,” Rasmussen said. “That's really important, especially for our herpetofauna in the state.”

He also pointed out that some Wyoming snakes are on the protected list, including the midget faded rattlesnake. They made the list, according to Rasmussen, because people were capturing them and they became popular in among owners who like to keep small venomous snakes as pets.

Rasmussen said awareness is the best protection for Wyoming’s elusive reptiles and he is excited to prove to residents that we don’t have rare snakes, only secretive ones.

Snakes of Wyoming 6 27 26

<title>Many Of Wyoming’s Seldom-Seen Snakes Aren’t That Rare, They Just Like To Hide | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Wyoming's bright orange pale milk snake, rubber boa and plains black-headed snake are elusive, but not as rare as most people think — they just like to hide. Most of the state's secretive snakes only come out at night or when conditions are right.

Many Of Wyoming’s Seldom-Seen Snakes Aren’t That Rare, They Just Like To Hide

Joan barron headshot 4 27 24

Joan Barron

Opinion

CSD Columnists

CHEYENNE —  A project to clean up an abandoned Atlas missile site west of Cheyenne has been at a standstill for the past two years.

Because there was no progress to report, the Restoration and Advisory Board for the Belvoir Ranch Cleanup Project has not held a meeting since July 2024

Consisting of local citizens and water officials, the RAB is the civilian oversight group for this huge complicated project that has been studied for more than two decades.

Although the multi-million dollar project has stalled in the past, this is the longest hiatus to date.

It may end shortly with a new feasibility study, according to information from the Wyoming Department of  Environmental Quality.

At issue is the solvent trichloroethylene (TCE), that airmen used to scrub the nuclear warhead rockets of their liquid fuel during the 1950s and 1960s.

Huge amounts of TCE, a known carcinogen that may cause liver cancer, ran off the launching pads into the ground and ultimately into the aquifer that provides about 30 percent of the City of Cheyenne’s water.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the group in charge of the project, earlier found the Atlas Belvoir Ranch Project contamination plume to be 4 to 12 miles long and 3 miles wide in places.

At one time, their studies showed the leading edge of the plume was estimated be 7 or 8 miles west of Cheyenne and was moving slowing toward the capital city.

The city had already experienced contamination in its municipal systems due to TCE.

The Army Corps of Engineers several years ago built a water treatment plant for the city, as well as carbon filter systems for area landowners who rely on well water.

The studies also showed that soil and groundwater samples from a well dug at a flame pit next to Launching Service Building No. 1 at the Atlas site showed the heaviest concentration of TCE found at the site to date.

The groundwater samples showed TCE levels of 240,000 parts per billion.

This compares to the 5 parts per billion that is the TCE level in water considered safe for human consumption by the Environmental Protection Agency.

One former project director on the project said it will take two remedies to deal with the contaminated plume — one at the top and one at the bottom.

“There never has been a cleanup,” said Kevin Royce of Cheyenne, the co-chair of the RAB in a phone interview.

Royce has been associated with the project for more  than 15 years, first as as technical consultant from his position in the Wyoming Water Development Commission, and after his 2021 retirement, as co-chairman of he RAB.

Two years ago the board was left with an unfinished feasibility study and then nothing further.

“It’s been at a standstill,” Royce said.

The feasibility study by a large engineering firm was rejected by the Corps of Engineers, which refused to extend its contract.

For the new study, it  took the Department of Defense a year to select another contractor.

Nearly a decade ago, in 2017, Wyoming’s Sen. John Barrasso, responding to complaints from citizens, had to step in and prod action on the project.

This time, the Barrasso staff wrote in an e-mail, the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality has assured that work will proceed now with a new contractor and feasibility study.

The feasibility study is drafted,and should be ready for DEQ review soon.

The  DEQ and the Corps of Engineers then will select a clean-up remedy, or remedies, and develop a “Decision Document,” the  DEQ statement said.

That document should be available this summer or fall.

If  this moves forward, the next step will be a recovery plan at long last.

Several years ago, a corps project director said his organization was committed to the project.

“We can’t let that plume pass into the city,” Doug Simpleman said.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"“We can’t let that happen”"}]

Contact Joan Barron at 307-632-2534 or jmbarron@bresnan.net

<title>Joan Barron: Carcinogen Cleanup Stalled In Cheyenne | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Columnist Joan Barron writes, "A project to clean up an abandoned Atlas missile site west of Cheyenne has been at a standstill for the past two years. At issue is a carcinogen that airmen used to scrub nuclear warhead rockets during the 1950s and 1960s."

Joan Barron: Carcinogen Cleanup Stalled In Cheyenne

Jen kocher

Jen Kocher

Law Enforcement

Authorities are working to unravel the mysterious deaths of a man and woman who were found in Laramie County earlier this year within three months of one another in unrelated incidents.

The first, a woman thought to be between 30 and 50 years old, was struck by a vehicle and killed on the side of Interstate 25 outside Cheyenne in late April.

The second is an unknown man found near a commercial building on South Greeley Avenue earlier this month.

Both deaths are under investigation, pending autopsy results from the Laramie County Coroner’s Office.

The fatalities were not publicly announced by authorities, but instead entered into the National Unidentified Persons System — known as NamUs — which is the country’s only centralized database for tracking missing and unidentified persons.

Although anyone with an account can enter missing people into the database, only law enforcement and those with coroners' offices can add unidentified people.

For both, distinctive tattoos could help investigators track down who they are.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Potential Assist"}]

Two NamUs entries for Wyoming in one week are unusual, say two amateur Cheyenne-based genealogists who run a pro bono company focused on reporting missing and unidentified people.

“It definitely caught our attention,” said Ashley Kroner, who along with her twin sister, Megan McWilliams, are cofounders of Genetics Uncovered.

As usual, they made posters for both John and Jane Doe, with photos of identifying tattoos added by the coroner’s office and shared on their 

Facebook page with more than 9,000 followers

The posts reached hundreds of people, potentially including members of the John Doe’s family, who contacted Kroner and stated they recognized the tattoos.

Kroner shared their information with Laramie County Coroner Rebecca Reid, who is responsible for making the identification, per state statute.

As of Thursday, John Doe was still listed in NamUs.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Mysterious Circumstances"}]

Little is known about the individuals and the circumstances under which they died.

Jane Doe was struck and killed by a vehicle at the mile marker 11 exit, potentially near the on ramp, between 8 and 9 p.m. on April 20, according to Aaron Brown, public information officer for the Wyoming Highway Patrol.

Brown said troopers rendered aid to no avail, and the woman succumbed to her injuries on the scene.

Her death remains under investigation, Brown said. He declined to share any additional details, citing an active investigation, though he added no charges are pending.

The victim is described as Caucasian with shoulder-length blonde, strawberry hair and unknown eye color. She was about 5-feet-7 and weighed 136 pounds.

She had a distinct tattoo on her right hip: A cloud with three zigzag lines beneath it, a sun emerging from the cloud’s left side and a star above the sun, and two clusters of triangles running along the far left of the lines.

Along with her clothing, a black and white duffle bag was found near her body, according to the NamUs entry.

Also citing an active investigation, Reid likewise could not provide any additional information.

John Doe was found dead June 6 at the 800 block of South Greeley Highway in Cheyenne, slumped in a kneeling position alongside a commercial building, with no cellphone or other identification.

His death remains under investigation, according to Chance Walkama, chief deputy of operations for the Laramie County Sheriff’s Office.

Walkama said his office is awaiting autopsy and toxicology results from Reid’s office. No foul play is currently suspected, but the cause and manner of death have not yet been determined.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Giving Them A Name"}]

McWilliams and Kroner said they were pleased their efforts might have helped lead to the identification of the John Doe and also credited Reid for entering both Does into the national database, where the public – and family members – can see them.  

why they started Genetics Uncovered in 2021

 with the mission of locating missing people and putting names to Jane and John Does.

Both sisters have decades of experience in genealogy. McWilliams, whose husband Scott oversees the Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation’s crime lab, taught a two-day class in forensic genetic genealogy for DCI agents and assisted the agency with a 1995 cold case in Carbon County.

McWilliams was also just accepted into an investigative genetic genealogy program starting this fall. Kroner, meanwhile, holds down a full-time job while pouring whatever hours remain into tracking down unidentified people and pushing law enforcement and coroners to enter them into NamUs.

Together, the sisters spend long stretches combing through ancestry records, burial registries such as Find A Grave, and newspaper archives, assembling family trees in hopes of giving the unidentified a name.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Success Stories"}]

This is part of their nationwide initiative, “Not Forgotten,” to track down unidentified people and get them entered into NamUs.

Once in the database, not only can law enforcement cross-check for missing people, but it also allows family members to provide DNA for possible identification should remains be found.

Without this database, there’s no central repository for law enforcement and families to find these individuals, many of whom have been reported missing.

They admit it’s an ambitious undertaking, but they have since recruited six volunteers to help tackle the vast territory, which they’ve broken down into geographic areas.

Between the eight of them, they have most of the country covered, but they still need volunteers in two areas: California, which is its own region, and a southern stretch comprising Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas.

[{"type":"text","text":"The work is paying off, they say."}]

To date, they’ve worked with law-enforcement agencies and coroner offices around the country to enter 35 new Does into NamUs.

Of those, at least one has been identified. In January 2026, authorities in Washington state positively identified the remains of a former mayor, Clarence Edwin Asher, 

who drowned while crabbing in an Oregon bay in 2006

The twins successfully added into the database in March 2025, making that identification possible.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Many More"}]

[{"type":"text","text":"There are hundreds more still to be located in Wyoming and beyond.  "}]

More than 15,000 unidentified individuals are listed the NamUs database, Kroner said, but she believes that number is much higher.

Along with the two latest entries, Wyoming has nine unidentified people listed in NamUs dating to 1977, including two of the sisters’ personal favorites, whom they’ve affectionately dubbed 

“Motel Mike” and “Pine Bluffs Pete.”

“Mike” died of an overdose in a Cheyenne motel in April 1977.  “Pete,” a transient, was hit by a train while attempting to cross tracks in 1996.

Both men remain unidentified, but at least they’ve since been listed in the database, McWilliams said.

There are likely several more. To date, the sisters have located four unidentified people in Wyoming dating to the late 1800s.

The challenge lies in determining how far back law enforcement and coroners are willing to go — at what point a case becomes too old to be worth opening. Knowing many agencies are understaffed and overworked, the sisters try to be thoughtful about which cases they bring forward.

Technically, the oldest case in NamUs is from 1915, but they’ve found even older unidentified people in Wyoming.

Their oldest case is a 35-year-old man who died near Cooper Lake in Albany County in March 1899.

A John Doe died in a Laramie railroad yard in 1908 and another was killed in a train accident in Sheridan County in 1910. A John Doe from Natrona County died in 1921.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Trains And Drownings"}]

As the sisters have learned, train deaths were common back in the day. So were drownings.

Many were transients just passing through foreign places where they met their demise – far away from family and friends, who had for whatever reasons lost track of them.

[{"type":"text","text":"Sometimes they get lucky and find accompanying news articles."}]

It’s the stories that get you, both sisters agreed. That’s where their hearts catch, in the space between life and data.

They shared a news clip about the last man killed by the train in Natrona County in 1932.

He’d been standing at the west end of the Platte River bridge outside Casper when a Chicago and North Western train out of Lander hit him, hurling him down a 10-foot embankment to his instant death.

[{"type":"text","text":"He bore no identification except a hat with the initials “J.T.M.”"}]

The train engineer told authorities he had blown the whistle repeatedly. The man never moved.

Boys swimming in the river below likewise had tried to warn him. Again, he kept walking without so much as a glance backward.  

Later, authorities concluded that he was likely deaf and never saw it coming.

Worse, those who loved him hadn’t even known he died, and still don’t because he has not yet been entered into NamUs.

It’s stories like these that make this work meaningful for the twins and compels them to continue on behalf of the missing and unidentified, 

including the two recent Does in Cheyenne.

“They don’t have a voice,” Kroner said. “I want to be that voice.”

John and Jane Doe 1 6 27 26

<title>Who Are John And Jane Doe? Twin Genealogists Hope Tattoos Can ID Cheyenne Bodies | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Twin genealogists are working to identify a John and Jane Doe found two months apart in Cheyenne earlier this year. “They don’t have a voice,” the sisters said, “but their distinctive tattoos could help investigators track down who they are.”

Who Are John And Jane Doe? Twin Genealogists Hope Tattoos Can ID Cheyenne Bodies

One More For The Road

After two weeks of fighting, Andrew Rossi and Bill Sniffin try to bury the hatchet by going camping together.....

One more for 6 27 26

<title>One More For The Road: Saturday, June 27, 2026 | Cowboy State Daily</title>

One More For The Road: Saturday, June 27, 2026

Heinz mark

Mark Heinz

Hunting

Wyoming is frequently called “the antelope capital of the world,” but with this year’s hunting tag results many hunters aren’t feeling it.

When the Wyoming Game and Fish Department announced draw results earlier this month, hunters’ social media forums started lighting up with comments like, “I struck out on antelope.”

For many resident hunters, the yearly ritual of entering the antelope draw once was essentially a formality. Hunters practically considered it a guarantee.  

That’s changed, and possibly for good, some seasoned Wyoming antelope hunters said.

Guy Eastman of Cody put in for a tag in Hunt Area 61, near Wamsutter, and didn’t draw.

Granted, that’s always been a tough tag to get because it’s in highly coveted hunting territory, said Eastman, who represents the third generation of the famous outdoor multimedia family.

"That’s the heart of Carbon County. That’s the number one county in the country for big antelope,” he said.

However, it is his fourth year in a row of striking out, which he views as unusual.

And it seems to be the same story across the hunting community, Eastman said.

“I don’t know anybody who drew a good antelope tag in my network of people,” he said. "I didn’t draw anything. Nor antelope, no deer, no elk. Not a darn thing.” 

Larry Hicks has hunted Wyoming antelope for decades. And as a state senator and conservationist, he’s been involved in wildlife policy issues.

This year, he applied for an antelope tag in Hunt Area 68, which he didn’t draw.

Area 68 is a highly desirable hunt area that runs from Jeffrey City to the north side of the Ferris Mountains.  

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Putting In For The Draw"}]

Wyoming offers both limited quota and general hunting tags for deer and elk. 

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"Antelope tags are limited quota only."}]

General tags may be purchased over-the-counter at any time.

Hunters must apply and pay for limited quota tags in advance, usually in May. Those who don’t draw tags have their money refunded, minus an application fee.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"}],"text":"Resident antelope tags cost $37."}]

Non-resident tags cost $326 for the regular non-resident draw and $1,200 for the special first-round non-resident draw.

When applying for tags, hunters list their first-, second- and third-choice hunt areas.

The draw system is set up so residents “don’t compete” directly with non-residents for tags because non-resident tag allocations percentages are pre-set, Hicks said.

The pricey special non-resident draw has much better odds than the regular non-resident draw, but there’s still no guarantee of getting a tag, he said.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Winterkill And Drought"}]

Many hunt areas in Fremont, Carbon, Sublette and Carbon counties are considered the best of the best, and were always difficult to draw tags, Hicks noted.

Even so, draw odds have dropped, mostly because herds in those areas are still recovering from devastating losses during the harsh winter of 2022-2023.

"We’re down tens of thousands of antelope, and a lot of those are in the premier areas across south-central Wyoming,” Hicks said.

And fewer antelope means Game and Fish will issue fewer tags.

“The drawing odds have gone to heck (in some hunt areas) because there are no tags,” Hicks said.

Some areas that might have had as many as 200 antelope tags a few years ago had only 25 resident tags this year, he said.

It could take up to eight years for antelope herds to recover from the devastating winterkill losses, “and we’re about three years in,” he said.

And current drought conditions could hamper the recovery, Hicks said.

“I worry about antelope fawn survival rates this summer in dry conditions,” he said. “If it gets too dry, the does will quit lactating in August, and the fawns will die.”

While numbers might be down in parts of Wyoming, the demand for tags isn’t.

Eastman noted that in years past, the number of first-choice applicants for Type 1 (any antelope) tags in Area 61 was about 500. This year, there were close to 600 applicants for 89 available Type 1 resident tags. And there were 183 second-choice and applicants and 106 third-choice applicants.

Wyoming hunters who didn’t draw antelope tags this year aren't alone. “I don’t know anybody who drew a good antelope tag,” said prominent outdoorsman Guy Eastman. They blame the winter of 2022-2023, which devastated antelope populations.

Daily Cartoon: Thursday, November 10, 2022

Michael P. Ramirez

Cartoonist

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Daily Cartoon: Thursday, November 10, 2022

Authors

Michael P. Ramirez

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