Besides the Altamont Pass and California, Wyoming is considered the other major destination of eagles where their carcasses have been found on a regular basis at the base of wind turbine towers in the United States, Smallwood said. The first eagle carcass Smallwood found was in a ravine in the Altamont Pass on his initial trip in 1999. That eagle was electrocuted by a power pole that connected with a field of turbines. “The feathers were burned and frizzled on the ends,” he said. “Eagles are big birds, and I thought, ‘What a waste.’”
Ecologist Shawn Smallwood has made secretive trips to Wyoming to collect data and provide to law enforcement information on eagles and other birds cut down by turbines. He said the wind industry turned on him because he’s “not a team player.”
LANDER — For decades, federal and state land managers have used a method of mowing and applying herbicide to Wyoming big sagebrush as a way to improve habitat for greater