Find Nature In Wyoming

Additional Wildlife of Wyoming

To flesh out your understanding of the region’s natural history, here is a breakdown of the specific taxa you can expect to encounter in the Equality State.

Birds (Avifauna) The Greater Sage-Grouse is the icon of the Wyoming shrub-steppe. The state holds the core of the global population. In spring, males gather on traditional dancing grounds called “leks,” puffing up their chests and popping air sacs to attract females—a spectacle that requires vast, unfragmented sagebrush landscapes. The Trumpeter Swan, once nearly extinct, has a stable population in the wetlands of the GYE, often seen against the backdrop of snowy peaks.

Mammals Wyoming is synonymous with the Pronghorn. Not an antelope but a distinct species related to the giraffe, it is the fastest land animal in the Western Hemisphere, evolved to outrun the now-extinct American Cheetah. The Grizzly Bear population has expanded significantly in the GYE, leading to increased interactions in the expanded range outside the national parks. The Bison herds of Yellowstone are the only free-ranging herds in the U.S. that have been continuously wild since prehistoric times.

Insects In the high alpine scree of the Absaroka and Wind River ranges, the Army Cutworm Moth (Miller Moth) is a critical ecological link. These moths migrate from the plains to the high peaks in summer to feed on alpine wildflowers. They hide under rocks during the day, where Grizzly Bears flip over stones to eat them by the thousands—a massive caloric boost of “insect fat” essential for winter hibernation.

Plants Big Sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata) is the defining plant of the state; it captures snow, retains moisture, and provides winter food for ungulates when grass is buried. The Indian Paintbrush (Castilleja linariifolia) is the state flower, a semi-parasitic plant that taps into the roots of sagebrush and grasses to steal nutrients. High in the mountains, the Whitebark Pine is a keystone species; its large, fatty seeds are a primary food source for Clark’s Nutcrackers and bears, though the trees are currently decimated by blister rust and beetles.

Fungi Wyoming’s dry climate limits some fungal diversity, but Fire Morels are a massive phenomenon. After the intense forest fires common in the lodgepole pine forests, massive flushes of morels appear the following spring. White Pine Blister Rust is a fungal pathogen of major concern, an invasive species attacking the high-elevation 5-needle pines that hold the snowpack and feed the wildlife.

Wyoming Biodiversity Profile

Wyoming is the “High Altitude State,” with the second-highest average elevation in the country. Biologically, it is defined by the tension between the High Plains and the Rocky Mountains, but its most famous ecological engine is the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE) in the northwest corner. This is one of the largest nearly intact temperate-zone ecosystems on Earth. Centered on the Yellowstone supervolcano, the GYE is a high plateau of lodgepole pine forests and geothermal features that supports the full historical suite of megafauna—grizzlies, wolves, and bison—that existed before European settlement.

However, the “Sagebrush Sea” of the Wyoming Basin covers much of the state’s interior. This high-desert steppe is not empty space; it is a critical habitat dominated by Big Sagebrush, a keystone plant that supports specialized species like the Sage-Grouse and Pygmy Rabbit. Within this region lies the Red Desert, a massive endorheic (closed) basin where water does not flow to any ocean. It contains the Great Divide Basin, where the Continental Divide actually splits and circles back on itself. This arid landscape hosts the largest migratory herd of Pronghorn in the world and serves as a winter range for thousands of mule deer.

Rising abruptly from these basins are the Wind River Range and the Teton Range. The Tetons are fault-block mountains without foothills, rising 7,000 feet straight up from the valley floor. The Winds, conversely, hold the largest concentration of glaciers in the American Rockies (outside of Washington), feeding the headwaters of the Green, Wind, and Snake Rivers.

The state is also defined by Migration Corridors. Research has revealed that Wyoming hosts the longest ungulate migrations in the lower 48 states. The “Path of the Pronghorn” and the “Red Desert to Hoback” mule deer migration are narrow, ancient highways where thousands of animals navigate fences, highways, and housing developments to move between high-elevation summer ranges and low-elevation winter basins.