Opinion ID: 170085
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Pole Mountain Area in Medicine Bow National Forest

Text: The Forest Service has long permitted livestock grazing in the Pole Mountain area of Medicine Bow National Forest, near Laramie, Wyoming. Under federal regulations the Forest Service may allow grazing on national forest land by issuing an allotment management plan, 36 C.F.R. § 222.2, and grazing or livestock-use permits, id. § 222.3(a). The allotment management plan must be consistent with the land management plan for the area, id. § 222.2(c), which in this case is the Medicine Bow National Forest and Thunder Basin National Grassland Land and Resource Management Plan (the Forest Plan), issued in October 1985. The Pole Mountain allotment management plan allows grazing of up to 2086 cattle and 1200 sheep during an annual season from June 1 to October 15. It divides Pole Mountain into eight livestock allotments, seven of which are used for grazing. It also adopts certain best management practices for grazing, including a prohibition on season-long grazing in a pasture, standards limiting the utilization of forage by livestock, and the use of a deferred-rotation grazing system in which only one pasture in an allotment will be grazed at a time and the order in which the pastures are used will be rotated each grazing season. Aplts. App. Vol. 2 at 409. Such practices are outlined in a publication of the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality entitled Grazing Best Management Practices. Aplees. Jt. Supp. App. Vol. 2 at 378. Grazing permits, which generally are for a 10-year term, 36 C.F.R. § 222.3(c)(1), were issued for the seven Pole Mountain allotments in 1999. They identify the maximum number of livestock and maximum length of grazing season for each allotment. They also explain that they can be cancelled, in whole or in part, or otherwise modified, at any time during the [10-year] term to conform with needed changes brought about by law, regulation, Executive order, allotment management plans, land management planning, numbers permitted or seasons of use necessary because of resource conditions, or the lands described otherwise being unavailable for grazing. Aplees. Jt. Supp. App. Vol. 3 at 575. The permits explicitly incorporate the allotment management plan into their terms. The limits set by the allotment management plan and permits on the length of the grazing season and number of permissible livestock may be altered by annual operating instructions issued by the Forest Service to grazing permittees. Annual operating instructions are not required by any statute or regulation; but the Forest Service Handbook for the Rocky Mountain Region contemplates their use and describes their function: They specify the annual actions necessary to implement the Forest Service's decision to authorize grazing in a particular area. They identify the obligations of the permittee and the Forest Service, . . . articulate annual grazing management requirements and standards, and [set forth the] monitoring necessary to document compliance. Aplts. App. Vol. 2 at 321. They also take into account developments, such as a drought, occurring after issuance of the allotment management plan and accordingly specify the maximum amount of grazing authorized for a particular allotment, the precise sequence of grazing on the allotment, and any other standards the permittee must follow that year when grazing.