Same Guys Dancing

[{"type":"text","text":"Aretha Franklin -- Freeway Of Love"}]

Same guys dancing 9 19 22

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

<title>Tuesday Morning Dance Party: Aretha Franklin -- Freeway Of Love | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Aretha Franklin -- Freeway Of Love

Tuesday Morning Dance Party: Aretha Franklin -- Freeway Of Love

Heinz mark

Mark Heinz

Wildlife

A Lovell man says he’s reasonably sure a bear he briefly spotted off Dayton Gulch Road in the Bighorn Mountains last week was a grizzly.

Casey Jones told Cowboy State Daily he saw the bear at about 3:30 or 4 p.m. July 2, and caught a video of it.

“The hump between the shoulders, that’s what got me to thinking it’s a grizzly,” he said during a telephone interview Thursday when he had brief service from the Bighorns.

His father, Levi Jones of Lovell, posted the video on social media, igniting a debate over whether the bear is in fact a grizzly or a member of the Bighorns’ significant population of black bears.

Retired Wyoming Game and Fish Department biologist Mark Bruscino viewed the video and told Cowboy State Daily that “I can’t tell for sure” whether the bear is a grizzly from the brief, distant clip.

Casey Jones said the bear is the first he’s ever seen in the Bighorns that he suspects is a grizzly, although he’s seen what he thought were grizzly tracks.

He added that he hasn’t seen the bear since he took the video or heard of anybody else in the Bighorns spotting it.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Reports Over The Years"}]

Rumors of grizzlies in the Bighorns have abounded for years.

Bruscino recalled getting reports as far back as the early 1990s.

“We had regular reports of them (grizzlies) in the Bighorns. And those that we followed up for we had no evidence or we confirmed that they were black bears,” he said.

Bruscino worked for Game and Fish for 29 years before retiring in 2013. He served as game warden, a trophy-game conflict officer and the large carnivore services supervisor.

The only officially verified grizzly in the Bighorns in recent memory was a sub-adult male 

 in April 2024. Wildlife agents killed that bear for preying on livestock.

John Baughman served as Game and Fish director from 1996-2002 and told Cowboy State Daily he recalled the department getting reports of grizzlies in unusual places during his tenure, but never a confirmed sighting in the Bighorns.

“There was one (grizzly) over by Cowley” in Big Horn County, he said.

And there were also frequent sightings of grizzlies near Ralston, in eastern Park County, Baughman said.

Grizzlies would also frequently show up in the fall east of Clark, also in Park County, drawn by ripening Russian olive trees.

“Those bears are crazy for Russian olives,” he said.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"How Could They Get There?"}]

Bruscino said if the bear in Jones’ video is a grizzly it will likely show up somewhere else in the area and be confirmed.

There’s no evidence of an established population of grizzlies in the Bighorns, he said.

For one thing, numerous domestic sheep flocks are in the Bighorns. Grizzlies are known to prey on sheep, so there would be numerous reports of attacks if grizzlies frequented the mountains, he said.

However, it’s “not inconceivable” for an “occasional disperser" to wander into the Bighorns, Bruscino said.

Dispersers, or lone bears roaming great distances, tend to be young males, he said.

And grizzlies are expanding their territory across the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, Bruscino noted.

“Expansion is happening. It’s happened over the decades, that’s obvious and documented,” he said.

As to how a grizzly might reach the Bighorns, there are a few paths that could take.

A grizzly could follow the Clark’s Fork of the Yellowstone River toward the Pryor Mountains and then keep moving into the Bighorns, Bruscino said.

“They could also possibly come across the Bighorn Basin undetected by following the Greybull or Shoshone rivers,” he added.

A grizzly might also traverse the Meeteetse rim to reach the Bighorns. Or one could also make a long circle around the Owl Creek Mountains, he said.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Difficult To Tell"}]

Distinguishing a grizzly from a black bear can be difficult, even for professionals, Bruscino said.  

He recalled that members of the Interagency Grizzly Bear Study Team would sometimes “send pictures of bears back and forth,” challenging each other to identify them as black bears or grizzlies. And sometimes, biologists would get the wrong answer.

Grizzlies can be mistaken for black bears when they’re wet because that can push down the fur around their telltale humps, he said. And a wet coat will also make a grizzly’s ears look larger.

Larger ears in proportion to the head are one telltale sign of a black bear.

He recalled an incident when he and another biologist were arguing over whether a bear caught in a snare was a grizzly or a black bear.

After they moved in to tranquilize and examine the bear, it turned out to be a female grizzly with a wet coat, Bruscino said.  

 challenging viewers to determine whether bears in a series of photographs are grizzlies or black bears.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Always Be Bear Safe"}]

Casey Jones noted that the area where he spotted the alleged grizzly isn’t far from where two campers, Shonna Kaye Dehl of Lovell and Maggie Bassett of Powell, were driven from their camp by an 

In an email to Cowboy State Daily, Game and Fish large-carnivore specialist Dan Thompson said the agency can’t offer comment on any particular video shared to social media.

He added that bear safety protocols, such as securing food around campsites, should be observed, regardless of which bear species is in the area.

Sheridan bear 7 10 26

<title>Distant Video Of Bear In Bighorn Mountains Reignites Debate Over Grizzlies In Area | Cowboy State Daily</title>

A Lovell man says he thinks a bear he spotted off Dayton Gulch Road in the Bighorn Mountains last week was a grizzly. Casey Jones took a quick video of the bear and said,"The hump between the shoulders, that’s what got me to thinking it’s a grizzly."

Distant Video Of Bear In Bighorn Mountains Reignites Debate Over Grizzlies In Area

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's business and tourism reporter, Renée Jean

Renée Jean

Energy

A crude-oil pipeline proposed between Guernsey and Cushing, Oklahoma, is poised to strengthen Wyoming’s role as a key crossroads in North America’s oil network — even though it likely won’t move a single barrel of Wyoming crude.

The project, called the Liberty Bridge Pipeline, will connect at Guernsey with a project previously proposed by Canada’s Southbow and True Companies’ for a 650-mile cross-border pipeline that would carry an initial 550,000 barrels of Canadian crude daily from Hardisty, Alberta, to Guernsey. 

The pipeline could eventually scale to 1.3 million barrels of crude per day.

The Guernsey hub is an important oil and gas crossroads in Wyoming, sending oil to the Midwest as well as to Cushing, but much of its capacity for the Gulf Coast was already spoken for. That raised questions as to how half a million or more new barrels of Canadian crude arriving in Wyoming would get to the markets that need it.

With the announcement of the new pipeline, the mystery is solved. 

Bridger Pipeline spokesman Bill Salvin confirmed for Cowboy State Daily that Bridger and Southbow are teaming to build the pipeline and that it will connect with the previously proposed pipeline from Alberta. 

“Bridger and Southbow are going to jointly develop the Liberty Bridge Pipeline through this joint venture that’s going to be called Liberty Bridge Pipeline LLC,” Salvin said. “And essentially it’s going to be along existing pipeline corridors.”

The joint venture has already begun outreach to landowners and communities along the route, Salvin added. 

The decision to move forward with Liberty Bridge Pipeline follows a successful open season for the previously proposed pipeline segments from Hardisty to Guernsey, which was outlined in May by Southbow in an online media statement. 

Even though the proposed pipeline won’t likely carry any Wyoming crude oil, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have significant economic impacts for Wyoming and its oil and gas industry.

Salvin didn’t have figures yet for how many construction jobs will be involved, but University of Wyoming economist Rob Godby has told Cowboy State Daily in previous interviews that such projects are likely to bring in substantial numbers of high-paying construction work, long-term pipeline jobs, and higher tax revenues for the state from oil and gas revenue. 

“Pipelines aren’t minor,” Godby has said. “They affect the local economies for a period of time.”

The Rocky Mountain Express Pipeline, built in the early 2000s, illustrates the dynamic.

“That was a really huge gas pipeline to move Wyoming natural gas to the Chicago hub and beyond,” he said. “It had huge impacts on our construction industry, because you had like, literally, man camps that were moving along the pipeline, and hundreds of welders working on different segments.”

Significant tax revenues are also associated with such projects for the state and counties along the route.

The project also has knock-on effects for the oil and gas industry, Wyoming oilman, Steve Degenfelder, who works as a land manager for Kirkwood Oil and Gas, told Cowboy State Daily. 

“Since Wyoming has always had a disadvantage because it is farthest from the main marketplaces, any additional capacity to Cushing, which in turn has access to the Gulf Coast, should help Wyoming oil producers get higher prices, which also translates into higher severance taxes to the state and ad valorem taxes to counties,” he said. “A lot of oil from Utah is even coming to Guernsey these days, because the refineries in Salt Lake City are full.”

The project also bolsters Guernsey as a hub, Denver-based oil and gas analyst Matthew Lewis told Cowboy State Daily. Lewis is founder of Plainview Energy Analytics.

“The Guernsey hub is a major hub,” Lewis told Cowboy State Daily. “It’s an important hub. It’s probably the most important hub in all of the Rocky Mountain area, and this just helps with that. Having all that storage there — it’s important to be able to batch different grades of crude. They’ll have to likely build significantly even more storage at Guernsey because of this project and that will help Guernsey.”

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"A Smarter Keystone XL"}]

The corridor from Alberta to Guernsey and then from Guernsey to Cushing does use portions of pipe laid for Keystone XL, which has had some describing the new pipeline as a revival of that project.

Energy analyst Kyle Bertamini, with energy research firm Enverus, describes the broader system as a kind of “segmented” Keystone.

“It solves a lot of the same initiatives that Keystone XL was trying to do,” he said. “But it’s doing it in a way that’s maybe less controversial and follows a lot of the rights-of-way of existing pipelines … making it a little bit easier to get some of the regulatory and necessary environmental permits.”

The new route differs from Keystone XL’s in a couple critical ways. 

First, it doesn’t go through South Dakota or Nebraska, where there was intense opposition to the pipeline from Indigenous and environmental groups. 

It also follows existing pipeline corridors, thus avoiding unfragmented agricultural land, which also became controversial for Keystone XL.

Liberty Bridge Pipeline will cut southeast out of the Guernsey hub, running through Colorado and Kansas to get to Cushing.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"With A Three-Part Build"}]

The pipeline is actually three overall segments. There’s the Alberta to Montana border segment, which is being built by Calgary-based Southbow, and there’s the Phillips County, Montana, to Guernsey portion, which Bridger Pipeline will construct. The third leg, Guernsey to Cushing, is the joint venture between Southbow and Bridger.

“That third segment is going to follow the Liberty right-of-way, which was a previously proposed pipeline project that has been canceled,” Bertamini said. “They’ll now build this third and final leg that will take the oil sands barrels down into Cushing.”

Capacity details for the Guernsey-to-Cushing segment haven’t been publicly confirmed, though its obvious purpose is to carry the crude oil from the previously announced segment, which will start with an initial capacity of 550,000 barrels of crude oil per day and can scale to up to 1.3 million.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"textStyle"},{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Challenges Have Surfaced"}]

The project already faces some wrinkles. A coalition of Montana residents and the Montana Environmental Information Center (MEIC), along with Earthjustice, have filed a legal challenge over a waiver issued to a Bridger Pipeline subsidiary that allows the company to skip certain corporate financial disclosures, as well as the state’s exhaustive environmental analysis, which includes calculated estimates of the potential size, frequency and geographic impact of pipeline leaks. 

The groups said under law Montana DEQ was strictly required to advance public notice and host a formal public hearing before granting such a waiver.

Politics, rather than environmental protests, are the project’s biggest obstacle, both Bertamini and Lewis said.

“You saw (permit revocation) two times with Obama and Biden,” Lewis said. “They can just revoke or not issue — and then the project’s essentially dead.”

That has Southbow calling for proof that a U.S. presidential permit is “durable” before it proceeds with its partial revival of the Keystone XL pipeline, company executives said during a May energy roundtable in Calgary. The company plans to decide whether to invest by mid-May 2027, but has said it won’t move forward without some assurance that its permit cannot just be revoked by a subsequent administration.

A legislative fix, which strips the executive branch of unilateral permit power, is working its way through Congress. 

The Promoting Cross-Border Energy Infrastructure Act has already passed the House but is stalled in the Senate, where it requires 60 votes to overcome filibusters. 

Still, despite that, optimism for the project is running high, Bertamini added.

“From our perspective, this has a higher chance of moving forward than Keystone XL did,” he said. “In terms of momentum, the likelihood of the pipeline getting constructed is quite high at this point.”

Guernsey pipeline 7 10 26

<title>Second Half Of Smarter Keystone XL Oil Pipeline Proposed, From Guernsey To Oklahoma | Cowboy State Daily</title>

A new crude oil pipeline proposed between Guernsey and Oklahoma that could carry up to 1.3 million barrels of crude per day would strengthen Wyoming’s role as a key crossroads. A national analyst said Guernsey is the Rocky Mountain's "most important hub."

Second Half Of Smarter Keystone XL Oil Pipeline Proposed, From Guernsey To Oklahoma

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily's general assignment reporter, Clair McFarland.

Clair McFarland

Government & Politics

Politics

David Giralt is trying to send a message to Wyoming voters. He's touting the endorsement of six sitting U.S. House members — plus rock star Ted Nugent. 

Giralt, a former active-duty Army Ranger from Casper, is running against nine other candidates for the Republican nomination to Wyoming’s lone U.S. House seat.

[{"type":"text","text":"The primary election is Aug. 18."}]

Giralt conceded in a Thursday phone interview with Cowboy State Daily that he’s short on name recognition in the crowded GOP field. 

He faces state Senate President Bo Biteman, former Superintendent of Public Instruction Jillian Balow, philanthropist Steve Friess and Secretary of State Chuck Gray, to name a few.

Giralt said he’s also “not the richest person in this race by any means." 

He faces well-heeled contenders such as Friess, Gray, and Casper businessman Reid Rasner.  

But Giralt has garnered arguably more high-profile endorsements than any other House candidate. Those include one from Nugent.

[{"type":"text","text":"Multiple U.S. House representatives have endorsed Giralt, he said. "}]

Those are Reps. Ryan Zinke (Montana), House Armed Services Committee Chair Mike Rogers (Alabama), Jack Bergman (Michigan), Jake Ellzey (Texas), and Pete Stauber (Minnesota). Giralt said Thursday that Rep. Rich McCormick, R-Georgia, has also lent his endorsement.

To Giralt, it’s a sign that, “Although my life goal hasn’t been building name-ID and trying to capture headlines, I can do the work. And there are very influential people who are senior in their careers who agree with me, and I think just driving that home is important.”

The endorsements reflect the time Giralt, a former congressional staffer, spent serving delegates in Washington, D.C., and what he calls the valuable relationships he forged there.

“Many of them, I’ve known them for years. They’re not fly-by-night,” he said. “It’s very rare for members of Congress to endorse in a crowded, 10-way primary.” 

Nugent, the rock star known for “Stranglehold” and “Cat Scratch Fever,” national spokesman for Hunter Nation and outspoken conservative activist, told Cowboy State Daily he researched Giralt and liked what he found.

Nugent also called Wyoming “one of the last states that represents real America.”

“My research showed me that David, as a veteran, Christian, Constitutional, conservative, conservationist, stands for and will fight for God, family, country, law and order, private property rights, game laws based on real science and against Fedzilla's overreach in the Cowboy State,” said Nugent in a Thursday email. “My conversations with the man fortified my trust.”

Giralt said he’s listened to Nugent’s music but didn’t know the rocker personally. He believes Nugent found him through his national news hits through conservative outlet Newsmax.

“We did have a conversation, off-air, before I was ever interviewed with him, and he had a lot of questions about public lands – stuff like that,” said Giralt, referencing the 

Giralt said he told Nugent the same thing about public lands he tells others: he seeks multi-use principles, responsible energy development, protecting lands “so we can recreate on them, hunt fish, enjoy the land – all those sorts of things.”

[{"type":"text","text":"Nugent is no stranger to Wyoming."}]

He hunted with the late Sen. Malcolm Wallop, R-Wyoming, on a muzzleloading pronghorn hunt to legalize the Hunters for the Hungry venison donation system for homeless shelters. That hunt was in October 1993. 

Cowboy State Daily executive editor Jimmy Orr founded the Hunters for the Hungry initiative in Wyoming while working for Wallop, and pitched the idea to Nugent while backstage at a concert in Baltimore.

Nugent also said he “arrowed a magnificent cow elk on another hunting adventure" with his son Toby. “Love Wyoming and everything she represents.”

Nugent said American families look to states like Wyoming “as an example of hope for all of America. Ranching, farming, freedom, conservation, rugged individualism, independent spirit, strong self-sufficiency and all the attributes of what the best of America still believes in.”

He said he believes Giralt will fight for those values “in this culture/spiritual war for the soul of the last best place.”

Giralt said the congressional delegates who have endorsed him are also serving in roles significant to Wyoming.

Rogers endorsed Giralt in April, saying he “has the backbone and the principles to hit the ground running in Washington.”

Rogers highlighted Giralt’s 12-year active-duty Army career and command of troops in multiple combat deployments to Afghanistan.

Giralt told Cowboy State Daily this endorsement “means a lot and is very humbling.”

He worked for Rogers for a year in a congressional fellowship program while still on active duty, he added.

The Armed Services Committee is one of the only authorizing committees that passes a bill annually, and it has for more than six decades, said Giralt. He said he hopes to serve on that committee if elected, and this endorsement tells voters he could do so.

“And (it allows me to have a vehicle to pass legislation and not just talk about it or say, ‘Oh I’ll build relationships when I get there, or I’ll learn about the process when I arrive.’”

Giralt said he also hopes to serve on the House Committee on Natural Resources, and Committee on the Budget.

Stauber chairs the House Committee on Natural Resources’ Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources.

Giralt announced Stauber’s endorsement Wednesday, in a statement in which Stauber called said Giralt would be “a strong voice for Wyoming.”

In May, Giralt announced the endorsement of Zinke, who is also a former Navy SEAL and former U.S. Secretary of the Interior.

Zinke serves on the House Appropriations Committee, which Giralt called a good fit, saying he wants to work toward fixing the nation’s exorbitant debt problem.

“If we want to actually tackle $40 trillion in debt, I need to work on the budget. There’s no way around that,” said Giralt. “I’m passionate about it.”

Bergman, who’s a retired three-star Marine Corps lieutenant general, voiced a “proud” endorsement of Giralt in a June 8 press release.

Giralt called that one’s meaningful because they have a “shared commitment to serving veterans and rural communities.”

“Jack Bergman is most likely the incoming chair of the Veteran Affairs Committee in the House,” Giralt said. “That matters significantly. Because we have one of the highest per capita rates of veterans anywhere in the country.”

Giralt said he wants to focus on rural health care and leveraging telehealth options for veterans, as well as end-of-life provisions and burial rights.

Committee members have “already said they want to work with me on that,” he added.

Giralt called Ellzey a leader on small business issues, and McCormick a leader on sentinel missile upgrades — more issues the candidate cast as important to Wyoming.

David Giralt and Mike Rogers 7 9 26

<title>Another Day, Another Huge Endorsement For U.S. House Candidate David Giralt | Cowboy State Daily</title>

David Giralt acknowledges that he has less name recognition than some of the nine other Republicans he's running against in the GOP race for U.S. House. He's also touting endorsements by six sitting U.S. House members — plus rocker Ted Nugent.

Another Day, Another Huge Endorsement For U.S. House Candidate David Giralt

Headshot of Cowboy State Daily political columnist, Rod Miller.

Rod Miller

Opinion

CSD Columnists

Every election season, we in the Cowboy State are confronted with hordes of political hopefuls who can’t think of anything better to do with their noggins than shove them into cowboy hats. The result is all too often an egregious abuse of this form of political speech.

Nothing says “dude” or “drugstore” more than a politician wearing a hat that makes them look they are cos-playing. So please consider this screed as a helpful primer on the proper wearing of a cowboy hat – a Stetsons for Dummies, if you will.

First, the venerable cowboy hat was invented as accouterments for working trail hands, to keep the sun and rain off their faces while they worked cattle. Beginning with John B. Stetson’s utilitarian “Boss of the Plains” model of 1865, the cowboy hat morphed into a value-laden symbol of haberdashery embraced by presidents, rock stars and Hollywood. But it began as a work tool.

 for politicians is this – if you aren’t willing to do the work, don’t wear the goddam hat. Sweat stains speak volumes.

About that symbology. The cowboy hat evokes the aesthetic of western virtues (and you can fill in your own blanks about what that means), and cowboys who embody them. 

 for politicians – if your heart ain’t right, don’t try to conceal that fact under a Stetson.

Cowboy hats come in all shapes and colors, but the lingua franca is a silverbelly Stetson with a 5-inch brim and a cattleman’s crease made from good beaver felt. You can try wearing a garish wide-brimmed lid with a high-domed open crown and feathered hatband, or a glittery spray-painted straw monstrosity bought under the stands at Frontier Days, but you’ll just look like a dork. 

A black hat with a flat crown will make folks think that you’re a truck driver or a top forty pop country singer. It will broil your brain on a hot day. Also, movie bad guys wear black hats. Stick with something conservative and understated..

 for politicians – if the hat you wear scalds your scalp or makes people snicker at you, don’t wear the hat.

I use the term “Stetson” as a synechdoche for all things cowboy hat, because that brand is the Rolls Royce of headwear. And the best place in the known world to buy a Stetson is Paris Hatters, in San Antonio, on Broadway across from Travis Park. Abe Cortez, the proprietor, has sold Stetsons to popes, politicians and famous jocks. He’ll try his damnedest to talk you out of buying something that will make you look dorky.

I’ve owned half a dozen Stetsons from Paris Hatters – from an ostentatious Tom Mix style with a rodeo pinch crown to an understated Open Road, the choice of presidents and hipster Americana singer/songwriters– and I have no complaints. I like to iron the thumb-rolled and taped-edge brim of an Open Road flat, and block the crown out into a Montana Peak, one of the more ancient shapes for a cowboy hat. 

A word about brims. The front brim of a cowboy hat should be curvilinear, not straight as a razor or a ruler. It should make the horizon convex to your eye, the sky should dip downward. Like a Dwight Yoakam or Chris LeDoux Stetson.

 – be more like Dwight Yoakam or Chris LeDoux, less like Kid Rock.

The “straw vs. felt” debate rages on, but I’ve settled it in my own mind by refusing to wear a hat made of something that my horse could eat. Politicians are left to decide for themselves on this conundrum.

“X” in cowboy hat nomenclature once meant the percentage of beaver fur in the felt, each X denoting ten percent. Madison Avenue has rendered “X” just another meaningless letter, as a rich dude can buy a 100X (do the math) hat if he has the cash. Forget the alphabet, and just get a hat that holds its shape in a stead drizzle.

Finally, there are three chiseled-in-stone laws regarding cowboy hats. Only three. Always set a hat down on the crown, never set a hat on a bed (or someone will die) and always remove your hat when dining with a lady.

If a Wyoming politician can’t commit to at least 80% of the above platform but still craves a modicum of cowboy credibility, they should just buy a King Ropes ball cap and call it good. Here endeth the lesson.

Rod Miller can be reached at RodsMillerWyo@yahoo.com

Rod miller headshot scaled

<title>Rod Miller: Sombrero Etiquette for Politicians | Cowboy State Daily</title>

Columnist Rod Miller writes, "Nothing says 'dude' or 'drugstore' more than a politician wearing a hat that makes them look they are cos-playing. So please consider this screed as a helpful primer on the proper wearing of a cowboy hat – a Stetsons for Dummies, if you will."

Rod Miller: Sombrero Etiquette for Politicians

Employee kate meadows cropped

Kate Meadows

Agriculture

A severe water shortage has one irrigation district serving eastern Wyoming and western Nebraska is warning that it could run out by the first week of August unless farmers and ranchers sharply improve efficiency.

The Pathfinder Irrigation District, which serves parts of eastern Wyoming and the Nebraska panhandle, told customers this week it is experiencing "extremely high water losses" throughout its canal system, with seepage levels far greater than expected after one of the driest winters on record.

The district operates a vast canal network that diverts water from the North Platte River at Whalen Dam, delivering irrigation to more than 100,000 acres of farmland. The water originates in Pathfinder Reservoir southwest of Casper.

The reservoir is now less than 24% full, 

according to the Bureau of Reclamation website

. District officials warned in a statement that water losses in portions of the canal system are among the worst the district has ever experienced.

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"Drought Driving The Problem"}]

George Finnegan, North Platte water scheduler and civil engineer with the Bureau of Reclamation, told Cowboy State Daily the losses are being driven almost entirely by drought.

Peak snowpack during the 2025-26 winter in the upper North Platte Basin — which supplies roughly 75% of the North Platte River's water — was the worst on record, he said.

The effects have rippled through the entire North Platte irrigation system.

Wyoming also experienced its fifth-driest winter since statewide records began in 1895. Nearly the entire state remains in drought, with about 45% currently classified in extreme drought.

Irrigation districts commonly begin drawing water in April. This year, however, deliveries didn't begin until June because there simply wasn't enough runoff.

"There really hasn't been a lot of water in the river filling those banks," Finnegan said. "Those banks have been very thirsty this year."

[{"type":"text","marks":[{"type":"bold"}],"text":"'Hungry Ground'"}]

With Pathfinder Reservoir less than 24% full, some farmers and ranchers in eastern Wyoming and western Nebraska are being warned they could be out of irrigation water by the first week of August. Drought has left reservoirs drained and canals low.

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