MaverickNH
NES Member
The Hunters, the Landowner and the Ladder That Triggered a Wyoming Showdown
Checkerboard pattern of public and private land creates perplexing access issue
www.wsj.com
Yes - checkerboard describes it well, but the checkers are trapped on their square.
ELK MOUNTAIN, Wyo.—As the name suggests, there are hundreds of elk on Elk Mountain, an 11,000-foot peak in southern Wyoming. The problem for hunters: You can’t get there from here.
The sprawling mountain is surrounded by private ranchland. While the prime hunting ground is checkerboarded with federal and state property, access is limited by an age-old Western doctrine. Ranchers consider it unneighborly for outsiders to hopscotch through their land by crossing over public sections that meet only at a corner.
Last year, four hunters from Missouri thought they had devised a solution to the access problem. Using a special stepladder, they climbed between two parcels owned by the federal Bureau of Land Management, taking care not to set foot on the private property on either side.