Where Bighorn Sheep and Fish Meet: Protecting the Wild Heart of the Miracle Mile

By Katie Cheesbrough, Executive Director, Wyoming Wild Sheep Foundation

If you fish the Miracle Mile, you already know this place is more than a Blue-Ribbon Fishery. It is one of the wildest pockets left in Wyoming. And sharing those ridgelines above the North Platte is one of the most important wildlife success stories in the entire state: the Ferris-Seminoe bighorn sheep herd.

This herd came back from the brink after decades of work. Today, it is healthy, disease-free, and strong. Even more important, it is Wyoming’s only viable source herd for rebuilding struggling sheep populations across the state. In short, the future of bighorn sheep in Wyoming depends on these mountains.

And right now, that future is under pressure.

The Seminoe Pumped Storage Project Would Hit This Herd Hard

The proposed project would bring at least five years of construction right through the heart of crucial habitat. That includes winter range, year-round range, and lambing areas that these sheep absolutely rely on to survive.

Heavy truck traffic, loud machinery, nighttime lighting, and dust would be constant. For bighorn sheep, especially during winter and lambing seasons, that level of disturbance is not just annoying. It is dangerous. Stress and displacement can reduce survival, lower lamb recruitment, and open the door to disease outbreaks in a herd that has stayed healthy against all odds.

And let’s be real. Once you break a healthy bighorn sheep herd, it isn’t easy to get it back.

Why Anglers Should Care

First and foremost, because this project will have impacts on the river and fisheries downstream.

Because the wildness of the Miracle Mile is a big part of why so many love fishing it.

Because the health of the trout is tied to the health of the land around them.

Because the Ferris-Seminoe herd is one of the greatest wildlife wins in Wyoming, and we should not put it at risk when there are smarter ways to plan and build.

And because if we stay quiet, decisions will be made without the voices of the people who know this place best.

This Is the Time to Speak Up

The Miracle Mile is too special to lose pieces of it in the name of energy development that only serves out-of-state interests. Anglers know this landscape. We see the sheep on the cliffs, the pronghorn on the flats, the sage grouse bursting out of the brush. We know what is at stake.

The Ferris-Seminoe bighorn sheep herd is strong right now. Let’s keep it that way.

If we want this river, this view, and this wildlife to stay wild, then we need to say so. Now is the time.