The wind blows in Wyoming. So much so that over much of its southern acreage, trees live in a constant state of sideways, bowing to the prevailing forces. Tumbleweed bounces through prairie sagebrush. The earth’s guts, buttes, and sawtooth ridgelines live outside its skin—exposed. There are rivers. And there are generally few roads and people between them.

Despite that, only five percent, or 3.2 million acres, of Wyoming is part of the Inventoried Roadless Area (IRA) chain—publicly accessible backcountry of the wild and uncut National Forest nature. It’s a small pinch on a girthy body of countryside, but it’s significant in a pro-energy state where petitioning to kill the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule is a political imperative.

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