November 8, 2024
To: Mayor Morton Levinson and Town Council Members
Re: Comment on Karns Meadow Development
Dear Mayor Morton Levinson and Town Council Members,
We are writing to you on behalf of the Jackson Hole Conservation Alliance, the Jackson Hole Wildlife Foundation, and the hundreds of community members who have spoken up to protect the wild life values at Karns Meadows. Today you will make a crucial decision on this CUP application for Karns Meadow Park about how we will develop and use the last natural stretch of Flat Creek in Town. Your decision will set the fate of this 43-acre meadow that provides critical winter habitat, important connectivity for wildlife movement, as well as bioremediation and infiltration of the waters of Flat Creek.
Just to be clear, the plan before you today is not our preferred alternative, which would NOT have a circumnavigating pathway and bridges. Both of which could be downscaled without a reduction in access or enjoyment of the meadow. An out-and-back pathway with one or no bridges was never analyzed as an alternative for reducing impacts even though we and many other community members advocated for this. Please consider conditioning those changes to this application to reduce the impact to wildlife and cost to residents.
One critical component of the current application is the winter closure. We know winter stresses wildlife, and we know winter closures are paramount to sustain these populations. Most National parks and National Forests do not have winter closures – but those in Teton County – Grand Teton National Park, Bridger Teton National Forest, and the National Elk Refuge all close select areas to protect critical winter wildlife habitat. They do this because herds of migrating ungulates depend on these winter closures to survive our harsh winters. Karns meadow is this winter habitat in Town – The Wyoming Game and Fish Department recognized this in their 2012 letter:
“Karns Meadow is one of the only remaining places within the Town of Jackson that provides an extensive patch of intact willow riparian habitat for wintering moose and mule deer.”
-Wyoming Game and Fish Department, in a 2012 comment letter
Karns meadow is winter range for moose (Figure 1), mule deer, elk, trumpeter swans, and bald eagles. It is clear that this meadow should not be open for human use in the winter.
The meadow is also situated along the major movement corridor (Flat Creek) between winter closures on the National Elk Refuge and Snow King – making it a critical movement corridor linking larger winter habitat (Figure 2). Human use in winter would add significant stress to wintering wildlife, displacing them to poorer habitat, which ultimately affects their ability to survive and reproduce.
Figure 2: Winter closures (dark purple) shown on both sides of Karns Meadow (highlighted with yellow border). Karns meadow is a major travel corridor along Flat Creek and from East Gros Ventre Butte to Snow King – human winter use would disrupt wildlife when they are most vulnerable, shrinking their available habitat.
The Environmental Assessments concludes, “The gains to recreational opportunities by an approximately 1.0-mile loop pathway are outweighed by the wintertime impacts to wildlife habitat” (EcoConnect 2019). The solution is simple – a winter closure of the meadow. Even the application before you recognizes the decision in the late 2010’s where winter use was “deemed too detrimental to the park’s ecology to be pursued” (Teton County Park and Recreation, Karns Meadow Masterplan Development Conditional Use Permit, pg. 2).
You likely know this, but recreation can have profound negative effects on wildlife. Research has shown that recreation is associated with increased stress hormones (Creel et al 2002), shifts in habitat use (Stankowich 2008; George & Crooks 2006), and lower reproductive success (Phillips & Alldredge 2000) for many wildlife species. Just last year, a study was published in our own backyard (Zeller et al 2024) showing how the noise from recreation (without any human presence) can displace wildlife and shrink their available habitat. The research, conducted on the Bridger-Teton, showed that noise from recreation triggers an anti-predator response for ungulates, causing them to flee and not return to those areas for some time (Zeller et al 2024). Many locals think that the animals will “adapt” to human recreation – but the research shows otherwise. Every time animals are disrupted in the winter, they experience stress, use precious energy, and are being pushed off valuable habitat.
In addition to protecting the winter closure supported by the applicant, we suggest the following improvements to the park design include:
- Reduce the need for a large retaining wall that will obstruct wildlife movement as well as the need for a costly bridge over the wetlands by eliminating the southern bridge and having the pathway go on the existing bridge and join the existing pathway on Snow King.
- Pavement has a negative impact on wildlife and would likely be costly to maintain in an active floodplain.
- Consider hard-pack cinder, gravel, or wooden walkways instead of pavement.
- To retain more native vegetation and reduce the impacts of pavement, reduce the pathway width to 8’ or less
- To retain more native vegetation, eliminate or reduce the size of the proposed 1.3-acre lawn
- To retain more native vegetation, install the parking lot on the street side and expand into the park if needed in the future.Thank you for protecting the important winter closure at Karns, and for doing all you can to reduce the impact of this park on wildlife. We appreciate your consideration of these comments and your service to our community.
Sincerely,
Kevin Krasnow, Ph.D.
Conservation Director
The Jackson Hole Conservation Alliance
Renee Seidler
Executive Director
Jackson Hole Wildlife Foundation
References:
Creel, S., Fox, J. E., Hardy, A., Sands, J., Garrott, B., & Peterson, R. O. (2002). Snowmobile activity and glucocorticoid stress responses in wolves and elk. Conservation biology, 16(3), 809-814.
EcoConnect Consulting. (May 28, 2019). Karns Meadow Environmental Analysis.
George, S. L., & Crooks, K. R. (2006). Recreation and large mammal activity in an urban nature reserve. Biological Conservation, 133(1), 107-117.
Phillips, G. E., & Alldredge, A. W. (2000). Reproductive success of elk following disturbance by humans during calving season. The Journal of Wildlife Management, 521-530.
Stankowich, T. (2008). Ungulate flight responses to human disturbance: a review and meta-analysis. Biological conservation, 141(9), 2159-2173.
WGFD. (2012). Pathways comment letter.
Zeller, K. A., Ditmer, M. A., Squires, J. R., Rice, W. L., Wilder, J., DeLong, D., … & Barber, J. R. (2024). Experimental recreationist noise alters behavior and space use of wildlife. Current Biology.
