Voters in November will decide whether to ban the practice, along with the trapping of bobcats. That prospect has set off a deluge of competing claims about what will happen if big-cat hunting ceases.

People supporting the ban say that mountain lion populations are self-regulating and will stabilize at a level supported by their available habitat and food resources. Those opposed to Initiative 91, meanwhile, say a hunting ban would induce a rapid increase in the number of big cats, which in turn would pose a significant threat to deer and elk herds.

The truth is likely a mix of the two, according to studies and experts.

But beyond biology, the statewide ballot measure is asking Coloradans to consider deeper questions about the future of Colorado’s wildlife, both opponents and supporters said.

State wildlife managers now set hunting limits on the number of mountain lions that can be killed while still maintaining a lion population, said Samantha Miller, the manager of the Cats Aren’t Trophies campaign. The ballot initiative’s proponents want wildlife managers to focus instead on how to foster the best and healthiest population possible for the intrinsic value of having the animal roam the landscape.

“I think it’s a fundamentally different question that we’re asking,” Miller said.

Mountain lion hunters represent about 1% of the more than 200,000 big-game hunting licenses the state sells every year. But hunters opposed to the measure fear it’s the first step in a slippery slope toward banning all hunting.

“You start taking out pieces of the puzzle and soon you don’t have a puzzle,” said Dan Gates, executive director and co-founder of the Colorado Trappers and Predator Hunters Association. He’s a leader in a number of groups opposing the ban, including Colorado Wildlife Deserves Better, Colorado Wildlife Conservation Project and Coloradans for Responsible Wildlife Management.

Self-regulation or out-of-control growth?

The number of mountain lions in Colorado is difficult to determine because of their elusive and solitary nature. Colorado Parks and Wildlife biologists estimate between 3,800 and 4,400 adult lions live in the state and say the population has grown since the species was classified as a big game species in 1965.

State biologists do not have an estimate for how many bobcats live in Colorado, but they believe the population is healthy and may be increasing in some areas.

Neither mountain lions nor bobcats are listed as federally threatened or endangered species. An estimated 20,000 to 40,000 mountain lions live in the U.S., as do more than 1.4 million bobcats.

“Both informal and recently collected empirical data suggest Colorado’s lion population is strong and lions are abundant in appropriate habitat,” states a Colorado Parks and Wildlife pamphlet on the species.

In the 2022-2023 hunting season — the most recent for which CPW data is publicly available — 2,599 people bought mountain lion hunting licenses and hunters killed 502 lions, making for a 19% success rate.

Those with opposing views of the ballot initiative posit different futures should mountain lion hunting be banned. But the truth is likely a mix of the two, said Jerry Apker, a retired CPW wildlife biologist who worked as the statewide carnivore biologist for 17 years before his 2017 retirement.

Populations would likely spike in the first years after hunting ends before increased mortality rates temper that growth, Apker said. Eventually, mountain lion populations tend to reach a stasis and fluctuate based on what food and habitat is available.

The felines have larger litters with higher survival rates when more resources are available, but in times of stress, they have smaller litters and more mortalities.

A cessation in hunting would also likely increase human interactions and conflicts with lions, he said. The most hunted lions are typically subadults and young adults — the same lions still working to establish home ranges. More young lions on the landscape means they will eventually be pushed to subprime habitats as well as more populated areas.

There’s no way of knowing how many mountain lions would live in Colorado should hunting stop — there’s never been a statewide research study done on the question, Apker said.

“I think the statements of doom and gloom that they’re going to take over are a convenient argument, but that’s not true,” he said.

Apker opposes the effort to ban mountain lion hunting, but he said other opponents’ argument that the ban would decimate elk and deer herds is far fetched. While predation might increase, the largest impacts to deer and elk populations would come from human alteration of the landscape. Less habitat, the degradation of existing habitat and brutal winters are significantly larger factors that determine population change.

California comparison

Colorado and other western states have enacted various levels of restrictions on mountain lion hunting.

The Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission earlier this year ended the state’s spring mountain lion season, instead restricting legal hunting to a single season that runs from November through March. The commission also banned hunters from using electronic recordings of other lions or distressed prey to lure mountain lions to an area.

The Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission in July voted in favor of stricter limits and shorter seasons for cougar hunting. It acted on a petition filed by a number of local and national conservation and animal rights groups.

California voters in 1990 chose to ban mountain lion hunting in the state permanently, though hunting of the felines had not been permitted since 1972 — when then-Gov. Ronald Reagan signed a moratorium. California is the only state with a full ban on hunting pumas, and it officially states that its aim is to instead conserve the species “for their ecological and intrinsic values,” according to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.

A study published in 2020 compared California’s lion population with those in 10 western states where hunting is legal, including Colorado. The authors found that California had similar cougar population densities and similar average deer densities as the other states.

California also had the third-lowest rate of cougar-human conflicts per capita, similar rates of cattle depredation and lower rates of sheep depredations.

“In sum, our analysis of the records obtained from state and federal wildlife agencies found no evidence that sport hunting of pumas has produced the management outcomes sought by wildlife managers aside from providing a sport hunting opportunity,” the authors wrote.

Charges of “ballot-box biology”

Proponents of the hunting ban say it is a way to address unethical hunting methods, like the use of dogs, and whether hunting is necessary to manage lion populations. Opponents say it is another example of “ballot-box biology” that lets the majority make decisions often left to wildlife managers.

Apker disagrees the initiative is “ballot-box biology” — he doesn’t think it’s about biology at all. Instead, the question is a broader referendum on hunting as a whole, he said.

“The bottom line is that there are people who think hunting is wrong,” said Apker, who has voiced his opposition to the ballot measure publicly.

Proponents of the ban say hunting for mountain lions is trophy hunting because hunters are allegedly seeking the thrill of the hunt as well as the skins and heads of lions — not the meat. The ballot measure, if passed, would ban trophy hunting, defined as hunting “practiced primarily for the display of an animal’s head, fur, or other body parts, rather than for utilization of the meat.”

Cougar hunters have said repeatedly that while they do often pose with their kill — just like elk and deer hunters — they also eat the meat and are not hunting solely for a trophy. Colorado law requires that mountain lion meat be prepared for consumption by hunters. Gates, from the hunters association, has made steaks, tacos and burritos from lion meat.

“Not only do people eat mountain lion, but they also cherish mountain lion,” he said.

But ballot initiative supporters express doubt — Miller, for one, says there’s no way to know whether meat is eaten. The campaign is not against hunting, she said, but opposes unethical hunting.

“There are plenty of other species to hunt that aren’t so problematic under hunting ethics,” said Erik Molvar, executive director of Western Watersheds Project and a lifelong hunter, during a news conference last month in support of the ban.

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A critically endangered species, condors flying in the wild and rugged canyons of northern Arizona and southern Utah number only 85 – a population hard hit in 2023 by avian influenza. They’re seldom seen in Colorado. But in late March this year, somebody killed one in a remote area northeast of Lewis and west of McPhee Reservoir in Montezuma County, Colorado Parks and Wildlife officials said in a news release.

This massive dead bird was discovered about 24 hours after it was killed, CPW officials stated.

“Previous leads have not yielded results,” the officials said, so CPW and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials are asking for any information regarding the killing and those who are responsible.

California condors are protected under the Endangered Species Act, which means it is illegal for anyone to harass, harm, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture, or collect them. Anyone involved in killing this condor could face a third-degree felony charge of wanton destruction of protected wildlife, with a maximum fine of $5,000, restitution of $1,500, and a five-year prison sentence, CPW officials said.

In 1987, the California condor population had declined to just 22 birds in the wild. A federally led recovery program has relied on captive breeding and release of condors. The total world population numbers more than 560, officials said. More than half are flying free in Arizona, Utah, California, and Mexico.

Anybody with information about the bird’s killing can call the Colorado Operation Game Thief hotline at 1-877-265-6648, send an email to game.thief@state.co.us, notify federal authorities by calling 844-397-8477, or submit it via cpw.state.co.us/hunting/poaching-and-operation-game-thief. Anybody providing information that leads to a successful prosecution may be eligible for a reward, CPW and USFWS officials said, adding that any requests for confidentiality will be respected.

Our coalition held a press conference Friday at The Wild Animal Sanctuary, the perfect venue, given that founder Pat Craig is renowned for saving big cats from horrific cruelty at the hands of mankind.

On this cool August morning, we saw a mountain lion, her sweet butterfly-patterned face hiding in the grass before she walked away, which is quintessential lion behavior when humans are present. We saw two lynx and a bobcat, making up all three of the wild cats that will be spared from trophy hunting and fur trapping with a “yes” vote.

Among the cats were CATs supporters: A powerful display of serious-minded voices for true wildlife conservation.

The room was silent, however, when shown raw footage of packs of dogs chasing lions and bobcats into trees, where they were shot as trophies.

Our campaign follows the journalistic virtue of “show, don’t tell” and this film shows the lion trophy hunting outfitters, who sell our wild cat as “your trophy” for upwards of $8,000 (the exact price for a lesser-maned African lion). In their own words, Colorado lion trophy hunters and fur trappers told the crowd that they were after their personal big trophy lion, a bucket list item, a thrill-kill.

Watch the video, “This is NOT Conservation,” on YouTube.

Veterinarian, Dr. Valerie Johnson, who holds a PhD from Colorado State University, connected the dots. “Mountain lion trophy hunters of Colorado are in the same vein as the people who pay big money to go to Africa and cut the tusks off elephants, or heads off lions,” she told the crowd.

Erik Molvar spoke as a hunter, although he’s a well-published biologist in wildlife conservation.

“Hunters are like me, they subscribe to hunting ethics … Hunting for big cats is trophy hunting, pure and simple. It’s not to fill the freezer, it’s to bring home a trophy … to brag about and impress your friends,” Molvar said. “That doesn’t respect the quarry, so it doesn’t deserve any particular respect from the general public, either.”

Perhaps the most well-received voice was that of J Dallas Gudgell, an experienced environmental scientist and member of the Fort Peck Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes.

“As an Indigenous person concerned with and raised in a framework of right relationship with the natural world, I find trophy hunting and egocentric activity upends nature’s natural balance,” explained Gudgell, who is Wildlife and Tribal Policy Director for the International Wildlife Coexistence Network, one of the 100 groups endorsing CATs. “I support the people’s right to participate in the Democratic process to protect wild cats from senseless use.”

Dr. Christine Capaldo, a specialist in feline medicine, spoke of the bobcat in her southwestern Colorado community who was fur-trapped and strangled to death just to sell its fur on the lucrative Chinese fur market.

“Allowing unlimited numbers of bobcats to be killed isn’t about wildlife biology or management, it’s about greed, trophies, the despicable fur trade to China, and a complete disregard for the welfare of wildlife …Colorado’s native wild cats should not ever be for sale.”

Dr. Mickey Pardo, PhD, a wildlife biologist in Fort Collins, recently featured in the New York Times and National Geographic for his work, explained,

“As a biologist, I support the CATs ballot measure to ban trophy hunting and trapping of wild cats in Colorado. The scientific evidence is clear that hunting these animals is completely unnecessary and the methods used to hunt them are exceptionally cruel.”

Deanna Meyer, born and raised in Colorado, runs a rural family farm in lion country, abutting National Forest Lands, and she will vote “yes” to CATs based on her personal experience.

“One Christmas Day two years ago, I followed the sounds, finding six dogs who treed a terrified bobcat on my land,” Meyer said. “I was infuriated when I found out that there was nothing I could do. When this initiative passes, it will end this harassment and protect lions and bobcats who aren’t causing conflicts with humans.”

Delia Malone closed the event, speaking as a West Slope field ecologist, and Wildlife Chair for the Colorado Sierra Club, which endorses CATs. She’s vice chair of Roaring Fork Audubon, which is one of six Audubon Societies of Colorado that endorses CATs as well.

“At my home in Redstone which borders roadless area, we’re lucky enough to have a cougar family that has lived in the forest above us for generations — we’ve never had a negative encounter with the cougar family,” Malone said. “Trophy killing of lions contradicts the science, it is ethically wrong and should be outlawed.”

Every speaker at this event shows Colorado voters who we are: A vast coalition of wildlife experts, conservationists and diverse citizens, statewide including the most rural citizens living with lions, who all agree that this kind of fringe hunting for heads and fur has no place in the great state of Colorado, where we respect ethical outdoor activities, including ethical hunting of deer and elk for food.

As Pat Craig said so well: “Let’s be clear: Mountain lions and bobcats are not a food source as many callous individuals like to suggest. Instead, they are hunted solely for their heads and beautiful coats.”

Julie Marshall is the director of communications for Cats Aren’t Trophies.

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The deadline to finalize the state’s ballot is coming Friday, but all of the citizen initiatives — meaning ballot questions pursued by members of the public, rather than the legislature — were finalized late last week. State election officials certified that the final ones had received enough petition signatures after clearing earlier regulatory hurdles.

Nine ballot measures from the public have been approved. But two of those — the property tax-related initiatives 50 and 108 — are both set to be withdrawn by sponsors as part of negotiations with the governor’s office and the state legislature, which on Thursday passed another property tax relief bill at the end of a special session.

The remaining seven citizen initiatives will join several questions referred to the ballot by the legislature, including one to excise an unenforceable anti-same sex marriage provision from the state constitution; another to institute a new tax on guns and ammunition; and a measure that would allow judges to deny bail to people charged with first-degree murder.

Here’s a breakdown of the citizen’s initiatives that will be on the ballot (minus the soon-to-be-pulled property tax measures):

Election overhaul

Proposition 131 — previously Initiative 310 — would change how Colorado runs elections for U.S. senators and congressional representatives; for governor, treasurer, attorney general and secretary of state; and for state senators and representatives.

It would institute fully open primaries for those seats, meaning that candidates from all parties and those who are unaffiliated would appear on the same ballot. And in the general election, it would create a ranked-choice voting system for those races in a process that’s also referred to as instant-runoff voting.

If more than four people run in the open primary, then the top four vote recipients — regardless of party — would advance to the November general election.

In a general election race that has more than two candidates, voters would rank the candidates by preference. For example, if there are four candidates, a voter would be asked to rank them from one to four.

In the first round of vote tabulation, voters’ first-place choices would be counted, with the lowest-performing candidate then automatically eliminated from contention. The votes of that eliminated candidate’s supporters then switch to the voters’ next-ranked candidate in the next tabulation round. The lowest-performing candidate is again eliminated, with their voters’ next-ranked active candidate getting those votes.

When two candidates remain, the top vote-getter wins.

If passed, the changes would go into effect in 2026 under the initiative. However, a late amendment to a law passed by the legislature in May has thrown a speed bump in front of that implementation runway, and if the initiative passes, lawmakers may wrangle further over how to implement the new law.

The measure is backed by Kent Thiry, the millionaire former CEO of DaVita. Thiry previously backed ballot initiatives to open Colorado’s partisan primaries to unaffiliated voters and to change how Colorado draws its congressional and state legislative maps, with a switch to independent redistricting commissions.

Abortion

Amendment 79 would elevate the right to abortion to the Colorado Constitution by prohibiting the government from denying, impeding or discriminating against a person’s ability to exercise that right. The initiative would also clear the way for state-funded insurance, such as Medicaid, to cover abortion services, repealing another provision of the state constitution that prohibits the use of public funds to pay for abortion.

Colorado lawmakers passed a bill two years ago that enshrined abortion rights in state law, though it didn’t affect the constitutional ban on the use of state money.

Because this initiative would alter the state constitution, it requires support from 55% of voters to approve it. The initiative is backed by abortion rights advocacy groups, including Cobalt and the Colorado Organization for Latina Opportunity and Reproductive Rights.

School choice

Amendment 80, backed by conservative advocacy group Advance Colorado, would enshrine school choice — which includes “neighborhood, charter, private and home schools” — in the state constitution. Those options already exist under state law, but charter school supporters of the initiative told Chalkbeat that they want to ensure that doesn’t change via legislative debates at the Capitol.

Similar to the abortion measure, this ballot question would need 55% voter approval to pass.

Trophy hunting

Proposition 127 would make it illegal to trophy hunt or commercially trap mountain lions, bobcats and lynxes in Colorado. That includes killing, wounding, entrapping or pursuing the animals, according to the initiative, as well as discharging a deadly weapon at them.

The measure includes a few exceptions, such as killing the animals for self-defense or trapping them for legitimate research purposes. The initiative is supported by the coalition group Cats Aren’t Trophies.

Parole eligibility

Proposition 128 would tighten state sentencing terms, requiring people convicted of certain violent crimes to serve more of their sentences before they become eligible for parole. If the measure passes, anyone convicted of second-degree murder, first-degree burglary, felony kidnapping or other listed crimes after July 1, 2025, would be required to serve 85% of their sentences before they could be released. That’s up from 75% in current law.

The initiative would also require that people who previously had been convicted of two violent crimes serve their full sentence if convicted for one of those listed felonies. The initiative is also backed by Advance Colorado.

Veterinary professional qualifications

Proposition 129 would create a new veterinarian position in Colorado: a “veterinary professional associate.” People seeking that position would have to hold a master’s degree in veterinary clinical care (or an equivalent level of qualification as determined by the state board of veterinary medicine).

This new type of provider would have to be registered with the state board. The initiative is backed by the Dumb Friends League, the Denver-based animal shelter, which says it’ll help boost the veterinary workforce. Critics, though, argue the initiative would allow for substandard medical care.

Police funding

Proposition 130 — another backed by Advance Colorado — would require that the state add $350 million to a new “peace officer training and support fund.” That money would have to be on top of existing funds already going to law enforcement agencies.

The ballot measure does not establish a new source for that money, like a tax or fee, meaning the state would have to pull the money from elsewhere in its budget.

The money would be set aside for increased salaries, for the hiring of area- or crime-specific officers, for training, and for other related services. The measure would also require that $1 million be paid from the fund to the family of each law enforcement officer killed in the line of duty.

Editor’s note: This story was updated Sept. 9, 2024, to include the official ballot titles for the initiatives.

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I have nothing against out-of-staters moving to Montana or working at a business. I fit both categories myself years ago. But I think this change in politicians’ backgrounds reflects a change in how Montanans view their identity.

Previous Montana politicians who weren’t government lawyers often came from farming and ranching or related businesses. Today’s business backgrounds are less intimate with Montana’s land. Gianforte started a software company. Sheehy founded imaging technology and aerial firefighting businesses. Downing, a real estate developer, has owned everything from self-storage units to vineyards.

Seeking business-friendly policies, Republicans have long favored candidates with business backgrounds. But today’s desire for political outsiders includes Democrats like Busse, a former firearms executive without experience in elected office. And recent high-profile Democratic candidates have included educators, managers, and a musician — in other words, people who have not worked daily with nature and its resources.

Montanans used to mistrust government officials who lacked intimacy with the land. But today, both parties elevate politicians who lack that intimacy, probably because Montanans care more about ideological issues such as immigration, abortion, inflation or gender identity.

Political power used to flow from grazing stock and vast acreages. Now it flows from Wall Street stock and scenic mansions. For example, Sheehy and Downing own homes in the chichi resort of Big Sky; Gianforte comes from the expensive Bozeman area; Busse comes from the scenic and pricey Flathead region.

Sure, those places are Montana. But Montana’s politicians once came from less-glamorous places, including bare-knuckle Butte, the faded mining metropolis; remote Libby, with its logging and mining economy; and dusty Billings, an oil and cow town. In the 2000 and 2004 gubernatorial elections, Democrat Brian Schweitzer owned a Flathead mint farm but bragged that he was raised on an eastern Montana cattle ranch.

In other words, politicians once claimed Montanan identity through shared experience. That often included in-state birth and always included land-based pastimes like hunting. Today it’s less “Are you a hunter?” than “Are you endorsed by the National Rifle Association?”

The shift makes it hard to interpret politicians’ actions. For example, in 2021, Gov. Gianforte killed a mountain lion and trapped and killed a wolf. Because he’s not a rancher-politician, we can’t understand, much less endorse, such acts in the context of a lifelong working relationship with land and livestock.

Similarly, Gianforte, Busse, and Downing have all been cited for various gradations of hunting violations. Should we judge them differently than we would a native-born hunter? And Sheehy’s company is deeply in debt. For a ranch, that wouldn’t be surprising. But for an aerospace company?

To the rest of the country, choosing leaders based on ideologies may sound familiar. But Montana, aka “Big Sky Country,” used to pride itself on being different. More place-based, more rural, more centered on the individual.

Outsiders may have dismissed such philosophies as insular and backward — but that dismissal was what made them outsiders.

How should we react to this change? We might celebrate that Montana is leaving behind its tired frontier myths. Or we might mourn the shift, because Montana’s extraordinary landscapes — and people’s deep relationships to them — were what once made the state special. As Montana changes from bovines to business and from rural to resort, its politics can feel like yet another big-box store featuring all the latest national trends.

Then there’s Senator Jon Tester, the lone elected Democrat who’s running for re-election. The third-generation farmer from the wide-open plains of Big Sandy represents the land-based tradition that Montanans once cherished. But do Montana voters still want a senator like that?

Regardless of outcomes this November, the act of choosing by ideology rather than deep roots in the landmarks a huge change.

John Clayton is a contributor to Writers on the Range, writersontherange.org, an independent nonprofit dedicated to spurring lively conversation about the West. The author of books including Stories from Montana’s Enduring Frontier, his newsletter is naturalstories.substack.com.

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The Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation said they would no longer provide the wolves after speaking with the Southern Ute Indian Tribe, which has reservation land in Colorado. The Washington tribes — which had been expected to be a major source for the next round of the reintroduction effort — withdrew their agreement in a June 6 letter to Colorado Parks and Wildlife.

“It has come to our attention that necessary and meaningful consultation was not completed with the potentially impacted tribes,” wrote Jarred-Michael Erickson, chairman of the Colville business council, in the letter. “Out of respect for the sovereignty, cultures and memberships of Indian Tribes in Colorado and neighboring states, who may be impacted by this project, the Colville Tribes cannot assist with this project at this time.”

Colorado voters in 2020 narrowly decided to reintroduce gray wolves and mandated that state wildlife officials do so by Dec. 31, 2023.

The plan detailing how CPW will execute the reintroduction effort states that the agency should release a total of 30 to 50 wolves within the next few years, a target it plans to reach by relocating 10 to 15 wolves every winter.

The controversial vote has caused deep frustration in Colorado’s ranching communities, where people say the wolves will negatively impact their businesses and ways of life. Support for the reintroduction primarily came from urban Front Range communities, while the rural areas where wolves would live opposed the measure.

Since the first December releases, wolves have killed or injured at least 14 cattle and nine sheep — including 8 sheep killed or injured last weekend.

Documents from the Colville Tribes’ business council show that the council discussed the issue on June 6 after learning Colorado officials “failed to consult” with the Southern Ute Tribe about the wolves.

The Southern Ute Indian Tribe has concerns about the wolves’ potential impact on livestock, deer and elk herds as well as the tribe’s use of the Brunot Area hunting rights reserved for tribal members, tribal leadership said Thursday in a statement. Tribal leaders said they would continue to work with Colorado Parks and Wildlife “to establish a framework for working together that enables the state to implement its reintroduction program while simultaneously recognizing the sovereign authority of the Tribe on tribal lands and the interest shared by the Tribe and the State in the Brunot Area.”

So far, CPW’s monthly maps showing where the wolves have roamed have indicated activity in the central and northern mountains, far from the Southern Utes’ southwestern Colorado reservation. But plans call for the next round of releases to occur farther south.

Colorado wildlife officials struggled last year to find a state or tribe willing to provide wolves for reintroduction here. The three states identified as ideal for sourcing wolves — Idaho, Montana and Wyoming — all rejected Colorado’s request for wolves.

CPW spokesman Joey Livingston on Thursday declined to discuss source negotiations and said the agency would issue a statement when it finds a source.

“We continue speaking with other potential sources of wolves,” he wrote in an email, “and will take great care in implementing the plan to create a self-sustaining wolf population while minimizing impacts on our landowners, rural communities, agricultural industries and partners.”

In October, Oregon agreed to provide up to 10 wolves over the coming winter. Ten wolves captured in Oregon were released in Colorado in December.

In January, CPW signed the agreement with the Colville Tribes for up to 15 wolves during the 2024-2025 winter.

Colorado wildlife officials have also talked with Washington state officials about potentially capturing wolves there. While Washington officials previously said they could not provide wolves for the first release, they indicated they were open to further conversations.

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The Colorado Secretary of State’s Office said Wednesday that the measure backed by wildlife advocates had garnered more than enough signatures to qualify for the Nov. 5 election.

Backers turned in 187,147 signatures. Election officials determined there were more valid signatures of registered voters than the 124,238 required. The proposal, organized by a coalition called Cats Aren’t Trophies, would outlaw what it calls trophy hunting.

The coalition includes wildlife sanctuaries and rehabilitation centers. Its members want to prohibit the hunting and trapping of mountain lions, bobcats and lynx. Exceptions would include killing an animal to protect people and livestock, the accidental wounding of a cat, actions by authorized wildlife officers and scientific research activities.

“Colorado voters will have an opportunity to halt the inhumane and needless killing of mountain lions and bobcats for their heads and beautiful fur coats,” Samantha Miller, the Cats Aren’t Trophies campaign manager and a Grand County resident, wrote in an email.

The ban’s supporters say mountain lions aren’t killed for meat, unlike deer, elk and other wildlife.

“While the measure stops the recreational trophy hunting and commercial fur trapping of wild cats, it allows lethal removal of any problem animal for the safety of people, pets, or farm and ranch animals,” Miller added.

But opponents argue state wildlife biologists are better equipped to manage mountain lion populations.

“We are disappointed to learn that the required signature level was reached,” said Suzanne O’Neill the executive director of the Colorado Wildlife Federation, in an email. “This is another instance of ballot-box biology presented to the voters. It aims to take away Colorado Parks and Wildlife expertise and (the agency’s) extensive experience in applying science-based wildlife management as to mountain lions and bobcats.”

Opponents of the proposed hunting ban made similar arguments about returning wolves to Colorado. The state’s voters in 2020 narrowly passed an initiative mandating the release of wolves in Colorado to bring back the animal that was wiped out in the state due to hunting.

CPW started releasing wolves in northern and northwest Colorado in late 2023. Since then, the wolves have roamed and run afoul of ranchers whose livestock has been killed.

State wildlife officials estimate Colorado’s mountain lion population at 3,800 to 4,400. They said hunters kill hundreds of mountain lions and bobcats every year.

While the initiative’s ban would cover lynx, that cat — which was restored to Colorado after a long absence — is protected under both state and federal law. Miller said if the measure becomes law, it would continue to protect lynx regardless of its status under endangered species regulations.

Updated July 31 at 9:11 p.m. to correct the state’s estimated mountain lion population.

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Frank Vigil stepped out of his truck to survey one section of fence built in recent years by the billionaire owner of 83,000-acre El Cielo Vista Ranch — one of Colorado’s most pristine and contentious mountain properties, with holdings that include one of the state’s 14ers. The barbed wire-topped fence stretched south across the high valley toward New Mexico as far as the eye could see. Green “NO TRESPASSING” signs were affixed to the fence intermittently, and a pole-mounted camera in the shape of an orb watched the gate where Vigil stood.

He and others who live in rural, sparsely populated Costilla County southeast of Alamosa estimate the multimillion-dollar fence now spans at least 20 miles of the ranch’s border. Locals in the tiny towns nearby fear the fence will block wildlife migration and that the erosion from 12-foot-wide paths bulldozed to make way for the fence will wash sediment and heavy metals into their water sources.

“We grew up here. We know people need fences,” said Vigil, 72. “But we don’t need to tear up the whole world to build a prison fence.”

Contention over the fence is the latest flare-up in decades of conflict between a succession of out-of-state billionaire owners of the property and the approximately 3,500 people who live along the ranch’s eastern border — some of whom have access rights on the land dating back to before Colorado became a state.

The fence construction pits the residents of one of the state’s poorest and most diverse counties, along with its local government, against the heir of a Houston oil family fortune.

Already, erosion from the bulldozed land along the fence pathway has gashed deep trenches in the dirt in some areas. Rainfall flushes sediment through the trenches and deposits the sand and gravel on county roads, into irrigation ditches and onto yards, residents said.

Locals have seen deer, turkey and elk pace the fence, their path blocked.

The ranch failed to seek county and state permits for the construction and ignored a moratorium put in place by the county, local officials said. The small government initiated an expensive legal battle, seeking — and last fall, temporarily winning — a judge’s order to halt the project.

The ranch’s owner, William Harrison, seems to be pursuing a war of attrition to build the fence, suggested Ben Doon, Costilla County’s chief administrative officer.

Harrison can afford unlimited legal resources. The county cannot.

“We can’t bankrupt the county for this,” Doon said. “We’re going to do what we can and what our conscience tells us to do, but at some point, the county commissioners might have a really tough decision to make.”

On Harrison’s side, his attorney, Jamie Cotter, said much of the ranch had been fenced for decades. The ranch needed the new, taller fence to keep out trespassers who do not have access rights to the property and to keep the ranch’s small bison herd inside, she said. The ranch doesn’t plan to encircle the entire property, she said — adding that the fencing project was nearly complete before a judge issued the order halting further construction.

Harrison has a legal right to build a fence on his private property, Cotter said. She suggested that the fury over the fence was limited to a small, vocal group of local residents.

“In the vast majority of instances, we’re just replacing fence that has been there — it’s not a new issue,” Cotter said. “What is new is the fervor of a small group of people who, I believe, are misinterpreting what the legal issue is, which is: What are the regulations and what does the fence have to do going forward? There is no legal claim that Mr. Harrison can’t build a fence or has to tear it down.”

Members of La Sierra Environmental Guardian Committee, which formed to oppose the fence, say that beyond ecological concerns, the fence construction also has psychological impacts.

It’s an intimidation tactic, a declaration of power and another element of the “low-intensity” warfare that has been ongoing for decades between ranch owners and the community, said Shirley Romero Otero, one of the hundreds of community members with legal rights to access the property for grazing and collecting firewood. People in the valley rely on the mountain property — called La Sierra by the community for more than a century — for firewood to heat their homes in the winter and space for their cattle, she said.

Not only does the fence keep wildlife in, Romero Otero said, it sends a message to the community at large, including those who have legal rights to enter the land: Stay out.

“He sees the land and water as commodities,” she said. “To us, you couldn’t put a price on it. It’s more than just a playground, it’s a connection to the land.”

Unique history, drawn-out disputes

The last major dispute between valley residents and the owner of the ranch property twisted through Colorado’s court system for more than 40 years.

Before Colorado became a state, a French Canadian trapper owned the ranch. He granted grazing, hunting and logging rights to Mexican and Spanish families who settled in the valley in the mid-1800s as an incentive to attract people to the area.

With almost no public land in the county, La Sierra was the only opportunity to access forest and grazing. For decades, the descendants of those Sangre de Cristo Land Grant families relied on it for subsistence hunting and firewood for heat during the valley’s long, cold winters.

In 1960, a lumberman from North Carolina, Jack Taylor, bought the ranch and closed access to the residents of the valley with land grant rights. The ensuing legal battle stretched into the new millennium and across subsequent owners.

Since Taylor, the ranch has been owned by a string of Texans: an Enron executive, a group of ranchers and, now, Harrison.

The 130-square-mile ranch was listed for sale in 2017 for $105 million and sold to Harrison, who was scheduled to receive his inheritance when he turned 30 that same year. The property listing boasted of trophy-size elk, a resident herd of bighorn sheep and ownership of 19 mountain peaks — including 14,053-foot Culebra Peak.

Harrison, like his predecessor, continued pressing the case over land grant access. A 2002 Colorado Supreme Court decision had allowed access to the property to about 5,000 descendants of the land grant families for limited grazing and firewood collecting. A year after purchasing the ranch, Harrison appealed the 2002 decision.

But a short time later, after the Colorado Court of Appeals denied his appeal, he announced that he would drop the litigation.

In a news release announcing his decision, Harrison said it was time for the ranch and the community to have a more positive conversation about the long-term management of the ranch.

“We all share a common bond in the land and its resources, so I’m hopeful we can start working towards agreements to make our shared resource work for everyone,” Harrison said then. “I look forward to a new year and a new approach to some very old problems.”

Meetings between land grant holders and Harrison quickly fell apart, however.

Three years later, Harrison started building the fence.

Sediment in the creeks, trapped wildlife

Shortly after construction began in 2021, Dr. Joseph Quintana noticed washes of rocks and sand began to appear on the road in front of his house after rainstorms.

The recently retired doctor has lived on the parcel of land off County Road K5 nearly his entire life. In the hills above his house, workers bulldozed a path over craggy hills and arroyos for the fence, but never actually built it. When it rains, sediment blocks the road, clogs the irrigation ditch in front of his house and spreads into his yard, he said.

In 2023, he said he measured a sediment wash 257 feet wide that was five feet deep in some places. The water cut ravines into the bulldozed earth, some as deep as 8 feet, he said.

“They’re building trenches instead of roads,” Quintana said of the bulldozed swaths, some of which are visible in satellite imaging.

County staff often have to clear roads of sediment after storms, county administrator Doon said, but the problem has worsened since fence construction began.

“There’s no question that the scars from the fences are making the runoff worse,” he said.

The ranch did not seek a state permit for the project, as required by state law, until after the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment sent a March 13 letter warning that the unpermitted construction may violate the Colorado Water Quality Control Act, CDPHE spokesman John Michael said in an email.

The ranch manager applied for a permit on March 29, and the department issued a permit on April 12.

The permit system requires the creation of a plan to control the discharge of sediment and other potential pollutants from construction sites and to protect water quality, Michael said. The ranch is responsible for staying in compliance with the permit, he said, though state water-quality staff plan to inspect the fence construction.

Cindy Medina, a community leader on water issues in the valley, came to San Luis to see the fence at the invitation of those opposing it.

“I don’t want to be overdramatic about this, but I got nauseous about it,” said Medina, who has worked on local water issues since the 1980s. “I couldn’t believe the damage. It’s really a degradation of their watershed.”

Some residents in the valley also worry what the fence will mean for wildlife. The fence is more than 8 feet tall and is topped with a strand of barbed wire — too high for many animals to jump and dangerous for those that attempt to do so. The wire grid that makes up the fence narrows to openings 3 inches tall, which is too tight for many animals like turkeys, coyotes and bobcats to crawl through.

Residents interviewed for this story shared photographs of turkey, elk and deer pacing the fence, unable to pass. Some sections of the fence block off access to the creeks that come down from the mountain range. If a wildfire were to burn through the property, residents worry that animals would be trapped against the fence.

Cotter, Harrison’s attorney, said ranch managers would allow the areas bulldozed for fence construction to return to their natural, vegetated state. They also plan to build more wildlife jumps in the existing fence so that animals can cross the fence more easily. But that can’t happen while the judge’s order halting construction is in place, Cotter said.

“We’re being yelled at for not having wildlife jumps, but at the same time being told we can’t put wildlife jumps in,” she said.

The fence does not align with Colorado Parks and Wildlife’s best practices for wildlife-safe fencing. The guidelines state that fences that are too high to jump, are too low to crawl under, have wires spaced too tightly and create a complete barrier are “problem fences.” It also warns against fencing a large area with a barrier that blocks wildlife movement.

But Colorado Parks and Wildlife does not have any legal authority over fences on private property, spokesman John Livingston said in an email. County regulations generally dictate fencing rules, he said.

County officials, however, said they have struggled to get Harrison to comply with existing local regulations.

An imbalance in resources

Costilla County did not have a regulation barring the installation of a fence like Harrison’s before construction started, said Doon, the county administrator. But other regulations did apply to the project: Construction work of that scale would have required a grading permit and a permit for construction inside the county’s watershed protection district, he said.

Even before the fence undertaking, Doon said, county officials often had to track down ranch employees to get them to fill out permits before building houses and other projects on the property.

Harrison and his ranch staff seem to think he is immune from local rules, Doon said.

“The part I struggle the most with is how combative and belligerent they’ve been about this process,” he said. “They’re refusing to get $100 or $200 permits, even with all the resources they have.”

Harrison’s resources far outstrip those of most of Latino-majority Costilla County, where a quarter of residents live below the federal poverty line and the median income is $34,500, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

The imbalance in resources is playing out in the legal fight over the fence.

County officials first learned of the fence project when constituents brought the issue forward in 2021. County commissioners in September issued a moratorium on fences more than 5 feet tall and grading of land to create such fences, but Harrison continued to build the fence.

“The fact that they built as fast as they could with three out-of-state crews during the moratorium was just a middle finger in our face,” Doon said.

The county filed a lawsuit and asked a judge to force the ranch to stop.

Cotter said the ranch’s legal team believes the moratorium was not legal. Harrison’s attorneys responded to the lawsuit with a filing that accused the county of using “the flimsy guise” of the moratorium to “single out” the ranch.

“Why? Because for years residents of Costilla County have been hectoring the (Board of County Commissioners), and the arms of Costilla County government more generally, to prohibit CVR from fencing its real property,” the response states.

The judge on Oct. 13 upheld the moratorium and found that thousands of feet of fence had been constructed after the ban was in place. Construction on the fence has been halted since the judge’s order came out, but Harrison has continued to fight the moratorium. A trial is set for Oct. 8. In the meantime, the county has asked the judge to order the ranch to take down all fencing built during the moratorium, which remains in effect until September, Doon said.

The case so far has cost the county about $80,000, and Doon expects the expense to grow substantially. The county is paying for outside legal counsel out of its general fund, which has an annual budget of $3 million.

The ranch has also filed a series of civil actions against individual residents of the valley, alleging trespassing and improper use of the land.

Since March 1, the ranch has filed complaints against 12 people for actions that allegedly took place months prior. One complaint alleges a person without access rights used a rights holders’ key to access the ranch to gather firewood in January. Another alleges three people trespassed on the land in October.

The ranch is not seeking financial damages from the alleged trespassers, Cotter said, but wants court decisions clarifying that people without access rights cannot go on the property.

Because the complaints are civil, not criminal, the alleged trespassers do not have a right to a free public defender and are left to pay attorneys fees out of their pocket, said Bernadette Lucero, a member of La Sierra Environmental Guardian Committee. She spoke to The Post during an interview that also included Romero Otero, another member.

As the legal fight over the fence continues, the members of the committee are looking to raise money to pay for experts to evaluate damage from the fence. They’ve contacted their representatives in the statehouse and Congress, inviting them to come see the fence and get involved in the fight, but have not heard back. They have collected more than 3,000 signatures of people who support their work, Vigil said.

If residents were concerned about a similar fence being built near Aspen or Vail, state officials would respond quickly to the affluent communities’ needs, Lucero said.

“But we’re dealing with it. We’re marginalized people with no political pull, who don’t have any money,” she said. “We’re just trying to live our lives and enjoy the history and culture that we’re all so proud of.”

Romero Otero interjected: “But what we do have is community and a long history of struggle. We’re not going anywhere — we’re resilient.”

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The anecdote from Noem’s new book, “No Going Back: The Truth on What’s Wrong with Politics and How We Move America Forward,” was first reported last week by The Guardian.

Noem took her 14-month-old wirehaird pointer, Cricket, on a hunting trip with older dogs to try to calm the dog down, according to the Associated Press.

But when Cricket killed some chickens during a stop on the return trip and tried to bite Noem, Noem took Cricket to a gravel pit and killed her.

The incident took place 20 years ago, but Noem’s retelling sparked criticism from Republicans, Democrats and dog experts alike, the Associated Press reported.

Noem addressed the backlash in a post on social media site X, stating the decision was difficult but she has “never passed on my responsibilities to anyone else to handle.”

Noem was elected as the first female governor of South Dakota in 2018 and “is on President Trump’s short list for Vice President,” organizers wrote on an event page.

The $150-per-person fundraiser is set for 6 p.m. Saturday at the Marriott Denver West in Golden.

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Gun shops could lose their state license. All House Republicans and nine Democrats voted against the bill which faces dimmer prospects in the more moderate Senate. If passed and signed into law, it will certainly be deemed unconstitutional in the courts.

The town of Superior passed a similar ordinance in 2022 and shortly afterward, U.S. District Court Judge Raymond Moore, an Obama-appointed judge, granted Rocky Mountain Gun Owners a temporary restraining order against it. According to the judge, the ordinance runs afoul of two Supreme Court decisions, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen (2022) and District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), which affirm the basic right to bear arms and stipulate that courts examine firearm laws according to the text of the Constitution and history.

Governments can restrict dangerous and unusual weapons like military artillery but not firearms “in common use.”

The firearms described in HB 1292 are in common use in the U.S. There are 20 million AR-style rifles alone. The bill contends that “assault weapons are not suitable for self-defense and are not well-suited for hunting, sporting, or any purchase other than mass killing.”

The Americans who responsibly own, maintain, target shoot, and hunt with the majority of those 20 million AR-style rifles as well as the shotguns and pistols described in HB 1292 disagree. The idea that no reasonable person can responsibly and peaceably own a so-called assault weapon is belied by the fact that so many do.

Recently a friend told me over coffee that he felt no one should own an assault rifle. The “no one should own” sparked a similar conversation weeks before when another friend had said, no one should own a pit bull; they’re too dangerous.

Indeed the muscular terrier accounts for more bites, more serious bite incidents, and more fatalities than other breeds. Of the 30 to 50 people who die each year in the U.S. from dog bites, pit bulls account for 28% of the deaths.

But this tragic fact needs context. There are 18 million pit bulls in the U.S. and the vast majority of pit bulls are gentle. Bite incidents have actually decreased over the past few decades even as cities have rescinded pit bull bans. The decline is due to increased spay/neuter rates (unneutered males are the most likely to bite), stray dog control, leash laws, and laws that hold irresponsible, neglectful, and abusive owners responsible for aggressive dogs. The fact that some breeds are more physically powerful than others is less relevant than the behavior of owners.

What is true for dogs is doubly true for potentially dangerous inanimate objects like firearms and automobiles. There are 20 million AR-style rifles and the vast majority of their owners will never brandish much less fire upon another person. Any firearm from a little single-shot derringer to an AR-15 rifle with every conceivable gadget is only dangerous in the hands of irresponsible people and those with ill intent. It is already illegal to maim or kill someone with a firearm of any kind or to even brandish such a weapon in a threatening or irresponsible way.

The fact that some firearms are more powerful than others is less relevant than the behavior of owners. Denying responsible, law-abiding citizens access to so-called assault weapons will have no impact on the criminal use of any weapon. Background checks and the investigation of threatening behavior and confiscation of weapons under Red Flag Laws will do far more to deter illegal gun use than placing new restrictions on law-abiding owners.

Krista L. Kafer is a Sunday Denver Post opinion columnist, adjunct professor of communication, journalism, and political science, and a frequent radio and television commentator.

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