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Claire Cella

Claire Cella grew up in the subtly tamer wilds of the Catskill Mountains in upstate New York, before she moved to Austin, Texas to pursue a bachelor’s degree in English and journalism, followed by a master’s in Information Science. In 2016, she decided she’d had enough of the Texas’s flat scenery and hot, humid climate and sought out Wyoming for the promise of mountains to hike, snow to ski upon and acres of public lands to explore. She joined the Wyoming Outdoor Council in 2016, working to leverage and promote the broader Keep it Public, Wyoming coalition, and now in 2017, has moved into a role where she manages the organization’s social engagement platforms as well as writes, edits and designs communications materials.

Story Behind the Photo: Barbara McMahill

Posted on by Claire Cella

Join Barbara and other photographers by submitting your own shot of Wyoming for the Outdoor Council’s 2024 Calendar Contest. You can enter your photos via Instagram or email. To submit your photo(s) via Instagram, you must have a public Instagram account so that we’re able to view your submission. Upload your photo(s) and add the hashtag #OurWyoming.

To submit your photo(s) via email, send your photo(s) to claire@wyomingoutdoorcouncil.org.

For more information about the contest, visit our calendar contest page.

Barbara McMahill saw a photograph of a Greater sage-grouse on a magazine cover a few years ago and was instantly enamored. When she mentioned the bird to a local Lander friend, she was told that it was actually possible to visit the bird’s breeding grounds, called leks, to watch them in the early spring. It wasn’t long before McMahill found herself at the edge of the Twin Creek lek, about 20 miles from Lander, watching the spectacle herself. She now goes out with her camera every year.

“It’s always special,” she says of viewing the sage-grouse, “because you need to wake up suuuuper early to see it. But they really do put on an amazing show. It’s just beautiful to watch. In the end, you do have to sit for quite awhile and it’s usually cold, but when the sun starts to come up over the horizon, there are five to seven minutes of just incredible light. I cannot even describe it.”

That’s why McMahill takes her camera — so she can attempt to capture a moment that is indescribable in words so that others can experience it, too.

“I’m no professional photographer,” she laughs. “I’m a veterinarian. But photography has always been present in my life. I was given my first camera as a present from my family when I was in fourth grade and I started to take photography a little more seriously about 20 years ago. Now, I just have fun trying to capture the beauty of each scene and sharing those with others. Sometimes, like that sage-grouse image, the moment just isn’t describable.”

The image she took that won placement in the 2022 calendar is a male sage-grouse in the snow-dusted grass. His speckled brown and gray wing feathers frame a white, fluffy chest concealing two vibrantly yellow air sacs. “The sun was hitting him just right,” McMahill says of the moment she pushed the shutter. What’s even more amazing about this display that the camera can’t capture, she explains, are the sound effects. During the sage-grouse’s mating dance, there are vigorous wing swishes and a series of clipped, soft coos before two pops as their air sacs expand. It’s truly a sight to be seen — and a sound to be heard.

McMahill wasn’t always so interested in birds. She grew up in Lisbon, Portugal, a city where “birds for me were either pigeons or sparrows,” she says. When she moved to Lander with her husband 10 years ago, she started to notice the diversity of birds in the region compared to her hometown. When COVID-19 sent many of us inside, and our attention was drawn longingly out our windows, McMahill became curious about birds and invested in a telephoto lens to better capture the feathered creatures that visited her backyard. She’s since found some bird-watching friends in Lander and has learned a lot from them as well as the Merlin app, a global bird guide for mobile devices. In addition to sage-grouse, she adores the springtime vocals of the meadowlarks and the return of the mountain bluebirds to the barren but budding tree branches each year. (She submitted a photo of a bluebird too, which we also selected for the calendar.)

McMahill never planned to live in Wyoming, but she’s glad she does. Not only is the local community a constant source of joy, fun, and support, but, “I’m surrounded by beauty.” She spoke of a recent trip to the Red Desert for the first time with her family. “It looks like a place that has been home to not only a lot of different groups of people, but also a diversity of animals for years and years. I realize that keeping these places as they are is very important. It’s part of the reason I — we all — want to live here.”

“It [The Red Desert] looks like a place that has been home to not only a lot of different groups of people, but also a diversity of animals for years and years. I realize that keeping these places as they are is very important. It’s part of the reason I — we all — want to live here.”

— barbara mcmahill

In fact, the Greater sage-grouse relies on landscapes like the Red Desert — large, intact, fenceless areas of sagebrush steppe — for its survival. And it’s not only sage-grouse, but thousands of other species as well. In recent years, this habitat has been dwindling across the West, and as a result, so too have sage-grouse populations that can survive nowhere else. The Red Desert is of particular importance to sage-grouse conservation efforts as it hosts the highest density of sage-grouse on Earth. In peak years you can find more than 100 males visiting leks in this region, whereas other leks average only 20-35.

Local efforts to protect Wyoming’s sagebrush steppe and the sage-grouse who rely upon it are ongoing— we’ve often discussed the importance of the Greater Sage-Grouse Core Area Protection Executive Order signed in 2008 by then Gov. Dave Freudenthal and renewed by his two successors. In addition to this state strategy, there’s a new opportunity on the horizon for further protections for sage-grouse: the recently released draft Rock Springs Resource Management Plan from the Bureau of Land Management. It’s a land use plan that’s been 12 years in the making, and in one alternative, the agency would rebalance management priorities to better support conservation in addition to other uses. This alternative would close much of the Red Desert — which includes significant portions of sagebrush steppe — to industrial development. This is in stark contrast to current management where a majority is open to development and poses a threat to sage-grouse habitat.

We’ll keep you updated on the ways in which you can make a difference in protecting this habitat and all the species, including the Greater sage-grouse, who rely on it for their survival.

And we’re grateful for photographers like McMahill who wake up before dawn and brave the cold to capture this one-of-a-kind spectacle every spring. It’s images like these that allow us at the Wyoming Outdoor Council to better tell the story of the iconic Wyoming species who share their home with us. If you’ve taken your own wildlife shots, send them to us! Our calendar contest is open until September 15 — and this year there are prizes and a chance to have your work in an exhibit. You can read more here.

THE 2024 CALENDAR CONTEST IS OPEN

Posted on by Claire Cella

At the Wyoming Outdoor Council, we’ve been thinking a lot about home lately. Where are the places we find it? Where are the places we choose to establish it? How do we continue to create a sense of it, expand it, and invite others into it? What happens when home isn’t so much a place with walls around it and a roof on top of it, as so many clichés say, but a feeling of belonging? A sharing of a broad sense of space with other humans, and also animals and other living things? What happens when home is felt in — or only for — a moment?

You may have heard that the Outdoor Council is moving “homes” soon from a small, old, cramped office building to another new, energy-efficient, inviting building down the street in Lander. We are excited for a forever home to continue the conservation advocacy work we do in Wyoming. We will welcome other organizations and groups in our community to use this space for meetings.

However, as an organization that operates statewide, we know that our home is bigger and broader than just Lander and just our staff and board — our home is Wyoming and all the people, places, and things that encompass it. There are landscapes we’ve bonded with and worked to protect and wildlife sightings we seek in the change of seasons. There is a familiarity with the first flowers that bloom on our favorite trails in the spring, or a deepening awareness of when the first frost usually hits our gardens. There’s the way summer feels on our skin, the sound of birds migrating south.

In this broad way, we hope that using the word “home” puts us on a common ground of understanding when we say “our Wyoming” is the enduring theme for our annual calendar contest.

Each year, we look to the calendar to tell a story about the home we’ve all chosen to make, create, keep, and defend in this state, and the ways in which we intentionally build that home. The bricks, beams, and foundations all look very different from person to person, and we always enjoy seeing the ways in which our members experience Wyoming — how you construct the scaffolding of your values in this state. The tradition of the calendar continues this year and we hope that you’ll help us strengthen the story of Our Wyoming by sharing photos of the ways in which you experience this place you call home — whether that’s been for millennia through your ancestors, for the length of your life, for a few days, or even hours. We love seeing you and friends out enjoying our state and city parks, or a place you’ve sought for solitude and silence, or the majesty of our free-roaming wildlife, or future generations of outdoor lovers (kids!) immersed in a scene.

WHAT’S NEW THIS YEAR

What is different this year about the calendar contest is that we’ve coupled it with both photographer prizes as well as the chance to be featured in an exhibition at the Cheyenne Creativity Center this fall!

All photographers who are featured in the calendar will receive a cash prize and will have their photographs printed and hung in an exhibit that will run through November 2023. Honorable mentions will also have their photos hung in the exhibit. More details are below and will be provided upon request and during the announcement of the winners. Good luck, we’re looking forward to seeing your photos of #OurWyoming!

TERMS & CONDITIONS

Entries must be submitted between July 15, 2023, and before midnight on September 15, 2023, either via email (claire@wyomingoutdoorcouncil.org) or Instagram, using the hashtag #OurWyoming. By entering, all contestants agree to release their photo to the Wyoming Outdoor Council for publication in our calendar and supporting social media. The Outdoor Council, along with guest judge Desirée Brothe, the public art coordinator of the Cheyenne Creativity Center, will select the winning photos, which will be published in the 2023 calendar. Thanks to support from First Interstate Bank in Cheyenne, selected artists will receive a modest cash award for photos included in the calendar, and honorable mentions. All photographers chosen to be in the calendar and honorable mentions will also have their work exhibited throughout November at the Cheyenne Creativity Center. WOC will be responsible for the printing and display of work at no cost to artists. An exhibit reception will take place on November 3 during Cheyenne’s First Friday Artwalk. All submitted photos are subject to use both in the calendar and the exhibit; however, if you would not like to participate in the exhibit, please email claire@wyomingoutdoorcouncil.org. 

Your entry to the contest constitutes your agreement to allow your entered photographs, as well as your name and the place the photograph was taken, to be published in the Wyoming Outdoor Council’s 2023 calendar and on the Outdoor Council’s website, in emails, and social media channels to promote the annual photo contest. It also constitutes your agreement to allow your winning photograph to be in the exhibit in Cheyenne unless otherwise communicated. Reproduction of entries will include the necessary photographer credit. Contest entrants retain ownership and all other rights to future use of the photographs they enter. Use of the entered photos in any other fashion or in any other publications will only occur with permission from the entrant.

Story behind the photo: MICHAEL LEE

Posted on by Claire Cella

Join Michael and other photographers by submitting your own shot of Wyoming for the Outdoor Council’s 2023 Calendar Contest. You can enter your photos via Instagram or email. To submit your photo(s) via Instagram, you must have a public Instagram account so that we’re able to view your submission. Upload your photo(s) and add the hashtag #OurWyoming.

To submit your photo(s) via email, send your photo(s) to claire@wyomingoutdoorcouncil.org.

For more information about the contest, visit our calendar contest page.

When Michael Lee told me the story behind the cover photo of last year’s calendar, he admitted that it sounded like a story that could have had an awful ending. We’re all glad it didn’t—and that, rather, it ended with a photograph that captured  a sweeping vista of the valley below and the Little Bighorn River. 

Lee, a professional photographer, and his wife, who live in a suburb north of Chicago, have been visiting Wyoming for years. This particular shot was taken in 2020, although the story started four years earlier in 2016. 

That year, Lee and his wife were driving around the Bighorn National Forest in the fall, just before hunting season was to begin. “As a photographer, I’m always looking for things to photograph,” he says. “We had been driving down a dirt road quite a ways. It was late in the afternoon and we were just waiting for the light to change. We had pulled over at a spot in the road where there was a view of an elk herd in the valley below. My wife was making popcorn on our propane stove.”

That’s when a big pickup truck pulled up next to them and a father and son duo stepped out. The four got to chit chatting and the father and son introduced themselves as the Buchanan’s from Casper who were scouting for wildlife because they had drawn a tag to hunt there. That’s when the father turned to them and said, “Well, if you like this view, we’ll have to show you another one you’ll like even better.”

Without a second thought, or consulting his wife, Lee said yes. As Lee climbed into the back of the Buchanan’s cab first, at the insistence of his wife, the father turned around to reassure them that “the guns were in the backseat with them.”

The four drove down the dirt road for another 10 minutes before they pulled over again, adjacent to a dense forest. The father beckoned into the woods and said, “It’s this way.” 

Lee laughs, “It sounds like the plot is thickening, doesn’t it? But we walked for about 100 yards, and emerged from the trees to the very view you see on the cover of the calendar.”

The four lingered for awhile at the vista, talking and getting to know one another, before they headed back to the pickup, unscathed. 

The picture on the cover was taken two years ago when the Lee’s returned to Wyoming on their annual trip, and decided to try to find the spot again, even though neither of them had marked it on a map. There is a name for the place, Lee says, but he doesn’t know it. He calls it Buchanan’s Bluff.

The experience—”Just a couple of Wyomingites offering to show us something cool”—was more proof for Lee that Wyomingites are pretty trustworthy and friendly. He’s even stayed in touch with the Buchanan’s over the years, swapping emails every once and awhile. 

“I’ve got a few Wyomingites in my rolodex,” he says. “You never know when you want to stop in and have a good meal.”

“I’ve got a few Wyomingites in my rolodex,” he says. “You never know when you want to stop in and have a good meal.”

— Michael Lee

The Lee’s return to Wyoming, or at least the West, every year. Lee’s been to Wyoming more than any other place, and has probably been to more places in Wyoming than in his own state, he admits. Although he loves the people that he encounters when he travels in Wyoming, he admits that Wyoming is special for its lack of people—which is a sharp contrast to his day-to-day life in Chicago.

He also loves the diversity of the Wyoming landscape. How in many parts of it appears so empty, yet those places are so rich with life and beauty. From the rugged mountains to the dry windy desert, to the warm welcoming people. Wyoming is a place that has not seen the kind of dense industrial development that he is used to in Chicago and his home state of Wisconsin.

He first fell in love with the West as a kid when his dad took him on a road trip in 1978. But he fell in love all over again, more recently, in 2001, when he took a few months off following a stint in New York City. He  visited a friend in Dallas and then continued west with a tent and a camera. “I had no idea what I was doing,” he says, as he traveled through New Mexico, Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming for two and a half months, just driving, taking pictures, being really dirty. “I loved every second of it.” 

He hasn’t let go of that feeling. He and his wife even backpacked in Wyoming for their honeymoon. When I asked him why he doesn’t just live here, he said the realities of life keep him in Chicago. It is there that he has the closeness of family and a community and  more professional opportunities  as a photographer. The jobs he is able to take there are consistent, interesting, and fun. This work and life in Chicago, affords him the ability to make a special visit to Wyoming once a year and completely shut his phone off. 

He doesn’t, however, shut his camera off, rather, he likes to use it as a way to give back to the places that he frequently visits and wants to support. “All of these places need all the help they can get,” he says. “And anyone who visits should, and could, do a little extra to take care of the place, like donating. But anyone can do that, and what I can do is a little different—provide photographs that organizations can use to raise awareness or get more people to open their checkbooks. That’s something these organizations don’t usually have a budget for.” He’s happy to be able to contribute to these causes in a special way. “It doesn’t cost me anything, and if my photograph can help raise awareness or convince a politician to vote a certain way or support a certain action, well, that’s just icing on the cake.”

Want to share that perfect shot? Our photo contest is open NOW!

Posted on by Claire Cella

Want to share that perfect shot? Our photo contest is open NOW!

For those of you familiar with our annual calendar photography contest, this announcement is coming a little earlier than usual. That’s because we’re mixing it up this year! The contest is usually in full swing by the height of summer, when everyone — residents and visitors alike — are out enjoying Wyoming’s rugged ridgelines, fishing those alpine lakes and streams, and enjoying friends and family around campfires and under starry skies. And because of that, we tend to get a lot of photos of summer’s sights.

Which, don’t get us wrong, we love, but what about winter in Wyoming? Or those first signs of spring — which are happening right now in parts of the state? What about that now-ness that comes from taking a picture and sharing it immediately? That presence?

This photo of snow-dusted pasque flowers by Karin Ebertz appeared in the 2022 calendar.
Barbara McMahill submitted this photo for last year’s contest.

That’s why we’re opening up the contest today! We want to see our Wyoming as it is just was, and as it is now. So send us your photos — from your last backcountry ski day or your first sighting of an Indian paintbrush underfoot. Every month, we plan to feature a submitted photo on our social media channels and in our email newsletter, in addition to the potential to see your photo in the calendar.

Submit your favorite photos by emailing me (claire@wyomingoutdoorcouncil.org) or sharing them on Instagram with the hashtag #OurWyoming. Entries for the contest will close on July 15, but we hope you’ll keep the pictures coming all year long. We’ll be sure to remind you from time to time!

Looking forward to seeing your photos of our wonderful, wild Wyoming, in all its forms.

TERMS & CONDITIONS
Entries must be submitted between April 15, 2022, and before midnight on July 15, 2022, either via email (claire@wyomingoutdoorcouncil.org) or Instagram, using the hashtag #OurWyoming. By entering, all contestants agree to release their photo to the Wyoming Outdoor Council for publication purposes. The Outdoor Council will select the winning photos, which will be published in the 2023 calendar. All submitted photos are subject to use.

Your entry to the contest constitutes your agreement to allow your entered photographs, as well as your name and the place the photograph was taken, to be published in the Wyoming Outdoor Council’s 2023 calendar and on the Outdoor Council’s website, in emails, and social media channels to promote the annual photo contest. Reproduction of entries will include the necessary photographer credit.

Photograph entries constitute permission to use the images in this manner with credit to the photographer without monetary compensation. Contest entrants retain ownership and all other rights to future use of the photographs they enter. Use of the entered photos in any other fashion or in any other publications will only occur with permission from the entrant.

What They Have to Give

Posted on by Claire Cella

what they have to give

The Wyoming Outdoor Council’s mission is to protect Wyoming’s environment and quality of life now and for future generations. I’ll admit that sometimes those two words, “future generations,” feel far off to me. They refer to my newly-born niece, yes, but also grandchildren and great grandchildren who I may never meet. Although none of us has a crystal ball to predict the future, we each have the present moment to make decisions that will have ripple effects into the future. That’s how we can all make an impact.

I recently talked to two Outdoor Council members who might be characterized as “the next generation.” One, Ted Rittle, is 18 years old and just enrolled at the University of Wyoming. The other, Nicole Gautier, is in her early thirties and works for UW as a research scientist. They both have chosen to donate to the Outdoor Council, and we wanted to find out why. 

Their reasons are layered, but there was a similar thread of seeing their parents and others committed to a cause, be it conservation, or botany, or the outdoors, and supporting the things they loved. It was these real-life experiences that played a role in their own decisions to become Outdoor Council members. The actions they’re taking as young adults ensure a better future for Wyoming and for those who come after them.

THE FIRST YEAR COLLEGE STUDENT 

Ted Rittle was born and raised in Laramie, Wyoming, where he currently lives and studies math education at UW. Talking to him, he has a prolific sense of place that I wish I had had when I was his age. He’s a self-taught fly fisherman who has developed his own favorite spots in the nearby mountains and rivers in just a few years. Although the rest of his family doesn’t fish as often, Rittle said his parents took him outdoors frequently growing up, where they would hike, camp, and Nordic ski. It was there that he learned to appreciate nature, especially wildlife. 

When it came to acting on this value, Rittle also had his parents to look up to. His father, Keith, served on the Outdoor Council board for many years and both his parents talked about the importance of donating 10 percent of one’s income to causes you support. 

“I came to really love the wildlife and want to support it,” he said. “There are certainly some special places in Wyoming that helped instill this in me — the Platte River Wilderness, for example. We’ve gone there since I was young. It’s so neat how much wildlife there was there. That really emphasized the importance of preserving the wilderness. I guess that helped me see the value of protected open spaces, too.” 

Wanting to go along with this idea and only just having started working, Rittle joined the Outdoor Council in 2021 and became one of our youngest members. (You may remember a story we did last year about our youngest, Jules Goldwarg, who was just six.) 

“Protecting wildlife in Wyoming’s open spaces is one of the reasons I chose to donate to the Outdoor Council,” he said of the decision. He said he’s seen WOC’s work on migration corridors and wildlife habitat, and donating felt in line with his values of promoting wildlife habitat.

“To me, it’s so neat to see other species out there, just going about their lives. I want to make sure they’re able to keep being here.” 

He plans to donate every year, he says, as well as stay involved in other conservation efforts such as citizen science efforts led by the local branch of the Audubon Society and Rocky Mountain Amphibian Project.

THE YOUNG PROFESSIONAL

Nicole Gautier, too, had a childhood steeped in the outdoors. She grew up in Oregon, with parents who had botany backgrounds. She remembers many hikes where her parents would eagerly identify the plants along their route. She remembers, too, that they were active in their state’s Native Plant Society. What she remembers most was always being outside — a value that’s remained a throughline in her life.

Gautier moved to Wyoming six years ago as a student in the Teton Science Schools’ graduate program, which has a focus on place-based, natural science education. Prior to that, she had led outdoor education programs at a variety of small organizations in the West but had found that the science component was lacking.  When she found the Science Schools’ program, and its partnership with the Haub School of Environment and Natural Resources at UW, she applied enthusiastically. After finishing the program, she was offered a position at the Haub School and, again, eagerly accepted.

“I wanted to stay in Wyoming and I was excited to stay in Laramie because of its access to public lands. Being an avid recreationist, climbing and running is how I like to spend my time. The variety of landscapes in Wyoming, from mountains to desert, still leaves me feeling that there’s so much to explore here,” she said. 

Her first introduction to the Outdoor Council was through Run the Red in 2017, where she ran and the Outdoor Council was a sponsor. She had never been to the Red Desert before and was impressed — both by the rugged beauty of the area as well as the work of the conservation groups advocating its protection. 

It was 2020 when she decided she wanted to give back and chose the Outdoor Council based on the good, recognizable work she saw, through our communications and events, as well as her own network of friends and colleagues. 

“The projects [WOC is] working on are very tangible. I’ve been to the Red Desert and seen how special that place is,” she said. “That personal connection was part of it, too.” 

She encourages other people to engage with their values in the same way.

“Consider the landscapes you’ve spent time in in Wyoming,” she said, “and then ask yourself, how might I give back?’ Giving $20 can be an easy way to feel a small part of this organization that has similar values,” she said. 

THE RIPPLE EFFECT

I write this at that time of year when many of us get reflective — looking back and making plans, seeing where we can improve, and setting goals to do so. There are many ways to engage in this practice, and many involve asking thoughtful questions of yourself. It can be framed as simply as Gautier’s: “What do I have to give?” Perhaps your answer is 15 minutes to write an email to your local legislator, or $20 to become a member supporting a cause you value, or a weekend to do volunteer trail work. 

Or the question could be as big as, “What’s the legacy I want to leave behind for future generations, and that I could start now?” The answer could be the same. You don’t know who is watching even your smallest action.

We commend and thank Rittle and Gautier for their support. Along with them, and countless others, we look forward to creating a strong, more connected community of members, this and every year.

Story behind the photo: BRANDON WARD

Posted on by Claire Cella

Join Brandon and other photographers by submitting your own shot of Wyoming for the Outdoor Council’s 2022 Calendar Contest. You can enter your photos via Instagram or email. To submit your photo(s) via Instagram, you must have a public Instagram account so that we’re able to view your submission. Upload your photo(s) and add the hashtag #OurWyoming.

To submit your photo(s) via email, send your photo(s) to claire@wyomingoutdoorcouncil.org.

For more information about the contest, visit our calendar contest page.

In the 2021 Wyoming Outdoor Council calendar, Brandon Ward’s three sons and their dog make two appearances within the pages: once perched at the smoky summit of Continental Peak, and later aboard pack rafts on the Sweetwater River. If anyone follows Brandon on Instagram (@wyoutside), you’ll see more appearances of his sons, Henry, Tucker, and Sawyer, and their dog, Shep. Brandon, of course, is there behind the lens. 

True to his username, there is only one picture of recent, or within reasonable scrolling distance, on his page that’s taken inside. And his images look rugged, but only because Wyoming is rugged — there are wide sweeping vistas of undulating striated badlands, and clouds forming unique bulges and deep pockets in the dense blue sky. There are steep canyons, and gushing rivers, and granite mountain summits, sure, but there are also his boys, down low and up close, exploring and discovering nature. A reminder that there’s plenty of easy, accessible, kid-sized adventures to be had in this state, too. 

In August, Brandon’s wife Karly goes back to work as a principal in Riverton, earlier than their sons return to school in Lander where the Wards live. Which leaves Brandon as the sole parent during the day for the rest of the month. It’s those few weeks where Brandon gets to spend quality time with his growing boys, which always, always involves the outdoors. 

“We get after it pretty hard, me and the boys,” he said with a laugh. “And while it would be really fun to stomp up into the Winds, it’s really equipment heavy.” And so he often takes them out into the Northern Red Desert, a quick drive from Lander, because the recreation out there is easier. “You can have an epic day hike, come back to your car for some car camping, and still see a lot of country.” The photo of his kids up on Continental Peak is something they do together once or twice a year because it’s a hike with “no bugs, no heavy packs, kid-friendly.”

Personally, Brandon likes the Red Desert for numerous other reasons, too. With a big honest grin, he told me that he doesn’t “like a lot of people around.” It’s the reason he moved to Wyoming in the first place after growing up in rural South Carolina and living in places like Georgia, Tennessee, and Colorado. “I’ve lived in big cities. I value low populations. There’s something to me about the lack of people. Even in the Red Desert, although it’s checkerboard with private and public lands, you can still generally pick a cardinal direction and go that way.”

When he takes his kids out, he tries to teach them to appreciate that fact.

“I think all kids in Wyoming sometimes are oblivious to the fact of how good they have it, if their interest is in outdoor recreation and public lands. Everything else in other states seems to be permit- or reservation-based or costs money to see. We have none of that here. Things are the way they are, unaltered by man. And that’s pretty precious and these places are becoming less and less. So I try to tell them to just appreciate it, because who knows what it will look like in 20 years.”

“I don’t know if they get it,” he follows with a laugh, “but at least I try.”

Brandon also has an affinity for the rivers in Wyoming, so another annual Ward family trip includes floating down the Sweetwater. It’s an adventure Brandon has gone on by himself, with friends, and with his family over 20 times, he estimates. Locally, he’s come to be known as the “Sweetwater Whisperer” for the knowledge he’s built over the years.

“I’ve been a river boater in one way or another my whole life,” he said. “From my earliest outings on rivers with my father in my home state to now passing that passion on to my kids here locally on the rivers in my backyard. I hope that they find the joy I have out there on this special river.”

He described the Sweetwater as mostly a gentle gradient, with grass- and willow-lined banks, and never-ending meanders that makes it great for a family adventure. His boys learned to paddle there. And its remoteness contributes to how special he finds it: “It feels like we are completely alone out there and exploring it for the first time.”

He’s been saddened by its degradation and continued levels of pollution, however. And over the years, he’s felt that he’s become more and more conservation-minded in proportion to the time he spends outdoors. 

“It’s hard not to care about these places when you’re within them so much. I’ve come to the realization that I’ve only ever been a recreationalist. I rationalize it as I’ve been a taker, not a giver, and for a rash of reasons this suddenly doesn’t sit well with me. My passion for the outdoors has taken me to many wonderful places and helped mold me into the person I am today. Many of those places are in danger from various threats, including the good-intentioned recreationalist.”

As he’s gotten older and more mature, he’s shifted his focus beyond recreation and has tried to learn about the environment he’s in as well as the current threats to that environment, even if that means grappling with his own impact as a recreationist. He began asking himself, “What can I do to lessen or remove my impacts?” and he’s found interest in sharing what he’s learned, especially with his kids and also as a photographer.

“I like to think that sharing these scenes that I photograph helps people to appreciate wild places they may have never heard of or will never get to go to or do it in the way I often do,” he said. “We are spoiled here in Wyoming with our scenery and remoteness. As a photographer, it’s hard to beat. Around every corner is a place worth appreciating and sharing.”

LAUNCHING THE 2022 CALENDAR CONTEST

Posted on by Claire Cella

For better or worse, the past year and a half taught us many things. In Wyoming, as in much of the United States, we witnessed one of the most profound and palpable lessons: a heightened appreciation for and desire to be outdoors as more and more people sought out natural places to find a mental and emotional reprieve from the uncertain times we were faced with. 


In many ways, Wyomingites are lucky to have a broad array of ways to enjoy the outdoors within the varied terrain and open spaces the state has to offer. On any given weekend afternoon, you can visit any patch of green space and see all types of people enjoying all types of activities. As the Outdoor Council, we want to honor that — the ways in which being outside is different for everyone and how none is any less valuable. We want to honor the fact that you take the time to even get outside. The understanding that we all bring our own experiences, upbringings, cultures, and perspectives to the outdoors and to our enjoyment of nature makes it more relevant and accessible — and in time helps us better protect the shared places that we all love in our own ways.


We all see the Instagram stories and Facebook posts of people’s adventurous feats: ascending the sheer walls of Pingora in the Wind River Range, packrafting down the Green River, running to the summit of Medicine Bow Peak, pedaling the Grand Traverse, or backpacking miles in to a remote backcountry site. And while these feats are admirable and inspiring, they are not everyone’s reality, nor should they be. 


We’re capable of just as much delight in the neighborhood City Park in Lander, picnicking with our families, watching children play in the cool waters in the heat of the day, camping with friends in the shadow of the Oregon Buttes, fishing along the Snake River, or spotting the first Western Tanager of spring in the tree near our homes. Nature, and its resiliency, is everywhere when we look for it, especially when we take the time to step out of doors and appreciate it — in whatever way we can, in whatever way we want, with whatever time and gear we have.


While other people’s adventurous spirits and athletic pursuits can be motivational, there is also boundless awe and wonder much closer and easier to attain. This year, here’s to finding meaning and enjoyment anywhere and any way that you chose to. We’re grateful for the opportunity to celebrate how you get outside and find your place in the outdoors.

TERMS & CONDITIONS

Entries must be submitted between July 15, 2021, and before midnight on September 15, 2021, either via email (claire@wyomingoutdoorcouncil.org) or Instagram, using the hashtag #OurWyoming. By entering, all contestants agree to release their photo to the Wyoming Outdoor Council for publication purposes. The Outdoor Council will select the winning photos, which will be published in the 2022 calendar. All submitted photos are subject to use.

Your entry to the contest constitutes your agreement to allow your entered photographs, as well as your name and the place the photograph was taken, to be published in the Wyoming Outdoor Council’s 2022 calendar and on the Outdoor Council’s website to promote the annual photo contest. Reproduction of entries will include the necessary photographer credit.

Photograph entries constitute permission to use the images in this manner with credit to the photographer without monetary compensation. Contest entrants retain ownership and all other rights to future use of the photographs they enter. Use of the entered photos in any other fashion or in any other publications will only occur with permission from the entrant.

Outdoor Council’s latest legal intern fills key role for conservation

Posted on by Claire Cella

The work the Wyoming Outdoor Council does as a conservation nonprofit takes the effort of a group of people with a range of skills, backgrounds, and expertise. Across the state, we have become known for our immersion at the Wyoming State Legislature each year, where our conservation advocates work with lawmakers to help craft and pass some of our state’s most important conservation policy. We’re also known for citizen engagement, which involves the entire WOC team in planning events (in-person and online) that bring our work to you, our supporters, members, and the public.

But beyond these more public-facing endeavors, a lot of our work goes on behind the scenes, quietly and diligently. It is within this work that the Outdoor Council staff attorneys play an invaluable role. And it’s seen in no better place than the small legacy of our legal internship program, which we’ve run informally for about 20 years and which has recruited some of our current staff including Executive Director Lisa McGee and Conservation Advocate John Rader. 

Our current intern is Alex Hamilton, a 28-year-old who is finishing up his law degree — as well as a master’s in Environmental Studies — at the University of Colorado-Boulder. His work so far with the Outdoor Council is proof of the critical role attorneys play in our work and more broadly in environmental conservation. It’s crucial to the watchdogging part of our mission — staff attorneys often are responsible for reviewing pages upon stacks of important legal documents to keep federal and state agencies and lawmakers accountable to their own policies, contracts, management plans, and legislation.

Alex’s particular interest has been in federal land use planning and management, which involves the land under the control of the Bureau of Land Management, the National Forest Service, and the National Park Service. Land use planning and management is the process of regulating the use of land by these agencies to allow for a variety of uses while preserving the land’s natural resources.

“I’m really excited to be working at the Outdoor Council on these particular issues,” he said, “because I’ve been working on the interface of federal and state law while at law school, and this is where WOC’s focus has been, too. With this last year being especially focused on school, it’s exciting to have tangible and meaningful work to do.”

For Alex’s internship, he’s already reviewed how the state of Wyoming has chosen to spend money from the Federal Natural Resource Policy Account since 2015. These funds can be used to take action in response to federal land, water, air, mineral and other natural resource policies, or to participate in environmental review processes.

Alex found that most of the expenditures have gone either to local governments to facilitate their involvement in federal land use planning or to the Attorney General’s office to fund litigation. But what he also found, and why the Outdoor Council was pursuing this research, was that despite the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho Tribes paying millions of dollars in taxes to help fund FNRPA, the tribes are not eligible to receive any of these funds. As a result, the tribes must fully fund their own participation in resource planning, while Wyoming counties receive tens of thousands of dollars in support from the state.

After finishing this review, Alex wrote a memo to Rep. Andi Clifford, requesting that the state legislature make the tribes eligible to seek these funds. The hope is to expand access to the account so that the tribes have the same support for engagement in federal land use planning processes that local governments do and so that it honors their vested interests in federal land use. Up until this point, the state has not allowed this.

Alex also has two other projects, both related to water quality issues. He’s reviewing the requirements that give the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality primacy over the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act. Primacy means that these state-level agencies like the DEQ have the ability to administer these acts, as opposed to the Environmental Protection Agency. If, however, the state agency isn’t meeting the criteria, the EPA can revoke primacy and begin to regulate these acts. Through his research, Alex is looking to ensure that the DEQ can meet — and is meeting —the requirements by adequately protecting Wyoming’s air and water in compliance with federal law. 

He’s also helping to look into next steps regarding the DEQ’s decision to require surface water quality samplers (such as conservation groups, students, or citizen scientists) to have advanced degrees and other qualifications to collect data for determining surface water quality standards. His research is helping us understand the options the Outdoor Council could pursue with the Environmental Quality Council as well as any potential violations of the Clean Water Act this decision causes.

While Alex admits that delving deep into dense legal cases, regulations, statutes, and other documents isn’t always easy, he knows how important the task is to being a lawyer. It’s like solving a puzzle, he said, and part of that involves getting to understand how certain agencies communicate both internally as well as to the public through these documents.

The tangibility of working as an environmental lawyer is what hooked Alex on the career path initially, too.

“That’s a big part of the reason I’m in this field,” he said.

This path seemed to have been worn in from an early age. Alex grew up on the outskirts of the shores of Lake Tahoe, in Truckee, CA, and proclaims to have always loved the snow (which is a lucky penchant to have when living in the West). He was a cross-country ski racer in high school and went to college in Maine to pursue the sport. It was through ski racing that he was first exposed to the Rocky Mountain West, which he described as “eye-opening.” Although not dissimilar to northern California, the scenery and sense he got looking out many a ski team van window was enough to have an impact. When he graduated with an undergraduate degree in Environmental Studies, he was already sure about two things: that he wanted to get back West and he wanted to pursue law.

“I knew that I wanted to work in environmental and conservation from early on in college. I cared a lot about the Mountain West and wanted to work to protect these places that I care about.”

When he graduates in May of this year, he hopes to seek a position with the federal government, perhaps with the National Forest Service as a natural resources planner. He thinks it’s vital that the government uphold its responsibility to the people and to the land, and he wants to be a career employee who dedicates his life to that.

“This experience with the Outdoor Council has really prepared me to have a holistic perspective on the land use planning process as I pursue a position within the federal government,” he said. “I’ve seen first hand how it plays out from an interest group and an advocacy standpoint, and so now I’m able to bring this breadth of understanding to my future career and hopefully facilitate full and fair participation when it comes to land use.”

“I knew that I wanted to work in environmental and conservation from early on in college. I cared a lot about the Mountain West and wanted to work to protect these places that I care about.”

Story behind the photo: “Thorofare” by Karinthia Harrison

Posted on by Claire Cella

You may not know it, but the image featured for the month of July in our 2020 calendar is a well-known view in these parts. The mule and two horses graze in the foreground of the most iconic views in Wyoming — Deer Creek Pass in the Thorofare, one of the truly last wild places in the lower 48. A few miles away from this point, at the southeastern edge of Yellowstone National Park, is the furthest you can get from any road, 20 miles. 

And this is the place that Karinthia Harrison feels most at peace, a place where “you can look out and just see endless country,” she said.

“And then,” she laughed, “I have to get to the other side.”

And she has, many, many times in some of the other wild, remote corners Wyoming has to offer — Buttercup Basin, Nipple Mesa, the top of Dead Indian Peak. Growing up on a ranch with her parents in Powell, Wyoming, Karinthia’s childhood was full of adventure — thanks to a father, Rick, who appreciated taking his children out into the mountains.

“Even just growing up on a farm,” Karinthia said, “you’re already connected to the land, the sunrises and sunsets. You work with your hands and you get used to manual labor. And then my dad always took us to do these rather extreme activities — we’d climb mountains, play in the rivers, we were always out hiking.”

And it stuck. Now, working as a nurse in the ER and ICU at West Park Hospital in Cody, Karinthia tries to do at least a long day trip into the wilderness every weekend, if not an overnighter.

These trips are often, if not always, aided by and shared with the quick-witted, strong company of mules and horses. After a lifetime of riding, she has a strong connection to them, even if “you sometimes need to cuss at them,” she admitted.

“But then you just have to laugh at them,” she followed. “They are my companions out there. They take care of me on the ride, and then when we get to camp, you take care of them. That was something I was taught by my dad: ‘You don’t get to eat or drink a beer until they’re taken care of.’”

She also loves the personality they bring to the trail, watching them figure out their way, whether that’s the route they take or the order they’ll stand in. And what they make possible. “I love that I can go out for six or seven days, and I can eat steak and salmon, and drink wine and beer. I am in the mountains, yes, but sometimes it’s nice to have a little luxury out there.”

On the particular trip when Karinthia snapped the photo on her exit from the Thorofare, she, her then-fiancee, now-husband Phil and four friends packed up a collection of 13 horses and mules and started on the trail at Ishawooa Creek, which lies up the South Fork near Cody and in the Shoshone National Forest. They traveled over 60 miles in six days, swam in rivers, spent a layover day in Silvertip, crossed mountain passes and descended dramatic creek basins, spotted cranes and wolves and a host of other wildlife, and came back out through the Washakie Wilderness on Deer Creek Trail.

Along with mules and horses, Karinthia also loves to share the mountain experience with friends and was grateful for the opportunity to bring the group back into this awe-inspiring landscape. “I want them to experience what I love experiencing, to get that appreciation,” she says. “But, I always let them know how hard it’s going to be, that we’re going to get very sore in the saddle, we’re going to have to walk, that we’ll take our only baths in rivers, that we’ll need to wake up and prep our animals every morning.”

“But, it’s so rewarding. It’s like what my dad used to tell me on the top of a mountain, he’d say, ‘You know what Tink [his nickname for her], just think, you’ve been to places, to mountaintops, that other people have never experienced.’”

She loves that wildness about Wyoming, and always has. That’s why she moved back to Cody after living and working for a couple of years in Alaska — which, while beautiful and rugged, was too inaccessible for her, requiring a plane or a boat to get to some locations.

“And I think Wyoming is the most beautiful state,” she said. “Really. You have such a diversity of ecosystems — the desert, the mountains, the wilderness.”

And she’s recently become more involved in helping to keep Wyoming this way.

“My dad, with his farming schedule, didn’t have time to be a part of committees or conversation groups, but now, I see these groups as being so important to Wyoming and keeping the state rooted in this way of life. And just because of how I was raised, and what we did, I can’t help but want to try to protect it, to keep it pure, natural, and full of wildlife.”

Karinthia said she contributes to the Wyoming Wilderness Association (where her sister Shaleas formerly worked as a community organizer), Wyoming Wildlife Federation, Wyoming Wild Sheep Foundation, and Wyoming Outdoor Council. She was also part of the Wyoming Public Lands Initiative, representing Park County on behalf of the local citizens, was recently elected to be on the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission’s chronic wasting disease working group, and has applied to be a part of the Cody conservation district. It’s hard to fit it all in with her full-time nursing schedule, but she recognizes how important it is. 

“I might not have had a choice in it when I was younger and with my dad,” she laughed, “but now, it’s just become part of who I am and what I love.”

Join Karinthia and other photographers by submitting your own shot of Wyoming for the Outdoor Council’s 2021 Calendar Contest. You can enter your photos via Instagram or email. To submit your photo(s) via Instagram, you must have a public Instagram account so that we’re able to view your submission. Upload your photo(s) and add the hashtag #OurWyoming.

To submit your photo(s) via email, send your photo(s) to claire@wyomingoutdoorcouncil.org.

For more information about the contest, visit our calendar contest page.

Story behind the photos: “Lincoln’s sparrow” and “Marmot” by Sean McKinley

Posted on by Claire Cella

“I’m done,” said Sean McKinley with an honest laugh. “I’ve found myself. I’m tired of cities and people.”

When he says done, he means living anywhere but Wyoming. And when he says he’s found himself, he means behind a lens. And when he says he’s tired of cities and people, that does not include animals.

“I have a huge soft spot for animals,” Sean said as he described his childhood growing up on a ranch in Buffalo — where peacocks, rabbits, sheep, pigs, bison, and a younger Sean roamed. He said his father was instrumental in helping nurture this appreciation for the creatures that humans share the world with. As an adult, his persistent adoration for wildlife has translated into a rewarding personal photography business, Hidden Wilderness Photography, which he runs on the side while also working full-timeas a computer programmer.

Two images Sean captured — and that we chose for the Wyoming Outdoor Council’s 2020 calendar — hint, too, at Sean’s incredible patience with and ceaseless fascination for the animal world. They also point to his ability to reverse the common idiom and see a single tree in the forest, to his benefit. 

Take his shot of a Lincoln’s sparrow perched amidst the textured, muted mauve of a willow thicket. It had been an early morning for Sean and his fiance as they awoke in Yellowstone National Park and set out to find the wildlife that also tends to wander about at dawn. Near Barronett’s Peak, Sean sighted two black bears on a distant hill playfully chasing each other and he set up his camera. And waited. And waited.

“I was hoping the bears would come closer, but they just continued to move in and out of the treeline. At a certain distance, you just can’t get a reasonably artistic photo. Then, because other people had started to gather after seeing my big lens, the bears eventually noticed and wandered off,” he recalls. “And I was about to pack up my camera, but decided to look around in the willows in front of me. And there, not feet from me, was this little Lincoln’s sparrow in the willows, and he looked right at me, and I pressed the shutter.”

He was surprisingly pleased with the photo of the little guy. “A happy happenstance,” he would call it. He particularly loved the cold blue feel, caused by the early sunlight and the overcast sky, of this photo we selected for February in the calendar.

A photo of a male marmot, which we included in November, was a similar story of patience and attention to detail. Sean and his fiance had again ventured off into Yellowstone behind Pebble Creek Campground at the far end of Lamar Valley — this time with their hopes set on finding a rumored fox den hidden among the granite boulder outcroppings. But instead, they came upon a colony of marmots. (Sean and his fiance, admittedly, have an affinity for rodents.) They decided to hang out and watch to see if any baby marmots would come out since they had never seen one before. The only marmot who made his presence known was a large male, though, who they assumed was tending to and protecting his brood. For minutes, they sat and watched this male dart in and out of the series of tunnels the marmots had built behind the rock. Frequently, the male would pause and stare them down, and that’s when Sean captured this shot. “There’s some personality there, for sure,” he chuckled. Sean and his fiance left soon after that, following the principles that Sean upholds when taking his photographs.

“I like to keep a respectable distance, and I like to think that I have an ethical approach. I never like to think that I’m invading an animal’s personal space just to get ‘the shot.’” he said. “And that’s why I pay way too much money for really large lenses.”

Sean started photographing his wild surroundings when he was about 14 and his family took their first trip to Yellowstone. Animals abounded, he remembers, and he was so disappointed he didn’t have his own camera to document all the creatures he saw. On the way home, his family stopped in Billings and bought him his first camera. The rest is history, with a little break in his late teens and early twenties. What sparked him to pick the camera back up again was another trip to Yellowstone and the wildlife within. Again, he returned to his then home in Portland, Oregon, and immediately purchased a new camera and a big lens.

Sean now lives in Worland and has been back in Wyoming for about four years after living “all over” in the Pacific Northwest. He decided to come back when he was “done” and wanted to reacquaint himself with the depth of the outdoors that he grew up with. “I think Wyoming is the most beautiful state in the union, and it’s accessible. And it’s appreciated. And it’s not overpopulated.”

Beyond his photography, he does what he can to support conservation efforts in the state, too, donating to nonprofits like Yellowstone Forever. He said it’s really important for him to see the state’s public lands remain public and accessible, and not become carved up by private interests. And he hopes his wildlife photography does a little of that work, too, showing people that this isn’t just a human world but that there’s much more out there. That there are animals, too, who depend upon the land.

“I hope my photos help cultivate a sense of respect and the idea that this is something we need to protect,” he said.

Join Sean and other photographers by submitting your own shot of Wyoming for the Outdoor Council’s 2021 Calendar Contest. You can enter your photos via Instagram or email. To submit your photo(s) via Instagram, you must have a public Instagram account so that we’re able to view your submission. Upload your photo(s) and add the hashtag #OurWyoming.

To submit your photo(s) via email, send your photo(s) to claire@wyomingoutdoorcouncil.org.

For more information about the contest, visit our calendar contest page.