JACKSON - Barry Reiswig isn't going to tell you a lot now that he's retiring. He's been speaking his mind all along.

Reiswig, 55, retired from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and as manager of the National Elk Refuge Friday, after working for the agency for 31 years. He is moving to Cody, where the North Dakota native intends to grow hay and spend more time in the backcountry with his horses.

Reiswig took over the reins of the elk refuge in 1996, when brucellosis and other disease issues were coming to a head in northwest Wyoming. From the start, he advocated for a reduction in the feeding program, saying it was the only way to stem the wave of disease in bison and elk - an ironic position for a manager of a 25,000-acre refuge established to feed elk.

That position has not changed for the trained wildlife biologist, and his candor about the issue has been his trademark in community meetings and in the media.

His trademark, too, may also have been one of the biggest challenges for him during his tenure in Jackson, which was "trying to get across the notion of the down sides to the feeding program, which is a revered program in western Wyoming.

"That's been the hardest because it is so popular, and it's been here for so long and in many people's eyes it's been very successful."

The view of the program as a success, in fact, has led to the Wyoming Game and Fish Department not to consider a phase-out of its own elk-feeding program, even in its recently adopted brucellosis management action plans for elk herds in northwest Wyoming.

The Game and Fish Department also aims to continue a vaccination program to combat brucellosis - a disease that can cause ungulates to abort their first fetuses and cause undulant fever in people consuming unpasteurized products from infected cattle.

That vaccination program was one Reiswig also battled.

Before 2001, the National Elk Refuge did not vaccinate its elk, which average about 7,500 on feed during the winter.

When Reiswig arrived at the refuge, the Game and Fish Department wanted to use a vaccine called Strain-19. Reiswig said he asked to see the data to show if the vaccine works. Refuge staff concluded the data showed the vaccine did not work.

"The state was not happy," he remembers. So he sent the data to three independent college professors from around the country, who also determined the vaccine was not proven effective.

"I said, 'If it doesn't work, we're not going to do it,'" Reiswig said. "They sued us."

The state lost both its lawsuit and appeal. But a change in presidential administrations in the 2000 election led to directives from Washington, D.C., for the refuge staff to conduct vaccinations.

Bison and elk

Reiswig also presided over the refuge's decade-long bison and elk environmental impact statement, which eventually calls for 2,500 fewer elk on feed in the winter and a significant reduction in the bison herd, from 1,200 to 500 animals.

The study was prompted when the refuge management wrote a smaller environmental review to allow for hunting of bison on the refuge. The agency was subsequently sued, with plaintiffs saying the hunt was allowed without taking into account the feeding program for bison.

Litigation is "part of the game these days," Reiswig said, noting that the lawsuit was "a disappointment, but we kept going."

Nor was he happy with the outcome of the environmental impact statement, which he called a compromise.

"It doesn't get at the root issue," Reiswig said. "The feeding program causes these animals to have diseases. They have diseases because we feed them. Our management causes these animals to have these diseases because of the crowding and the nose-to-nose feeding. The root cause is not, 'We don't have the right vaccine'; the root cause is there are far too many animals crowded on a small area for a long time. Normally, that doesn't happen."

Reiswig would have preferred a feeding phase-out. That would mean a "significant reduction" of animals that spend the winter on the refuge, and a reduction in the Jackson elk herd, he said.

But, the decision in the environmental impact statement "may move it in the right direction, lower elk a bit, lowering bison," he said.

"A lot of disease experts think it's really not enough to where (the federal Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service) wants us to be," he said. APHIS has increasingly become involved in wildlife management in northwest Wyoming after outbreaks of brucellosis in cattle herds caused the state to lose its brucellosis-free status in 2003. It has since regained the status, but the area remains one of the last pockets of brucellosis in the country.

"What's interesting about this whole system is you have millions of acres of public land, yet elk for the most part are kind of warehoused on these 23 postage-stamp size areas," Reiswig said, referring to the refuge and the 22 state-run feedgrounds.

Elk are generally not encouraged to spend winter off of feedlines, he said.

What people say

Reiswig, for all his candor, has had few, if any, confrontations with those who don't share his viewpoint.

Last winter, he came under fire from Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife, a pro-hunting group, which said he did not feed the elk early enough and calves died from starvation. Reiswig said the mortality was within normal limits.

Nonetheless, Bob Wharff, executive director of Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife, said he thought Reiswig did a "good job" managing the refuge.

"He did a lot of work, in particular for the elk refuge," Wharff said, adding that Reiswig is a sportsman. "Where we may have disagreed on how to manage things, Barry devoted a lifetime to helping wildlife. I hope he has lots of time to go hunt and fish and do the things he enjoys doing."

Lloyd Dorsey with the Greater Yellowstone Coalition also thanked Reiswig for his years of public service.

"Barry has handled his years in the Jackson Hole community with the utmost of respect for the customs and diverse views of locals and visitors alike," Dorsey said. "He has helped to ensure that the best science possible is made available to inform all the stakeholders, and he has patiently and professionally conveyed his best assessment about changing the artificial feeding paradigm on the refuge. Barry clearly believes that healthy wildlife and habitat should be the legacies this generation leaves for the enjoyment and benefit of future generations."

Mary Gibson Scott, superintendent of Grand Teton National Park, worked with Reiswig to develop the elk and bison management plan.

"In my time working with Barry as a federal land manager, I've admired his honest, straightforward approach toward many of our common resource issues," she said. "Barry has taken a holistic view of resource conservation, and advocated for all wildlife, not just the Jackson Hole elk herd. His desire to strike a balance for sustainable wildlife populations will ultimately lead to better wildlife management."

Look back and forward

Reiswig grew up on a ranch in North Dakota, where his parents raised cattle and wheat. His first paying job was building fences for the U.S. Forest Service. From there, he was interested in natural resources work in the public sector, and earned a degree in wildlife biology from Colorado State University in 1975.

He worked in several national wildlife refuges in North Dakota, Alaska, Montana, Oregon and Idaho, focusing on migratory birds, managing antelope and sea life. His work also honed skills that would serve him well in his most high-profile position at the National Elk Refuge.

Reiswig said the biggest challenge for his successor, Steve Kallin, who came to the refuge from the National Bison Range Complex in northwest Montana, will be implementing the new elk and bison plan. He also said disease will be "a big issue."

"Chronic wasting disease is out there in the wings," Reiswig said. "This is not going away. We need to be looking at the long term."

That long-term look means finding a way to let elk winter off of feedlines.

In southwest Montana, he said, wildlife officials over the course of 50 years acquired native range through purchases, easements and retired allotments.

"That's where we need to be heading over the long term," he said. "It takes a long, long time. Decades. This notion that we're going to Band-Aid our way out of it isn't going to work."

Barring a disease outbreak, Reiswig doesn't think feedgrounds will disappear anytime soon. In fact, feedgrounds may be the issue that defines his career.

Asked what his legacy might be, he said, "Moving into a long-term strategy to make elk wild animals again, not livestock, but it's been a tough go."

Retirement message

As he heads for the hills, so to speak, Reiswig's message is unchanged. Wyoming is in a complex state when it comes to wildlife management/

"The good ol' days are gone," he said. "If we're going to have wildlife in the future, if we're going to have natural values in the future, we have to start planning."

He said Wyoming used to be a place where people think they "could have it all forever."

"It's becoming very clear that we're past that point," he said. "If we don't start making very hard decisions, we're not going to have it all."

"I think we're really at a crossroads," he said. "If there are people out here that think we can't lose this, they're crazy. We can lose our clean air, big game herds, sage grouse, we can lose it all. It's not an endless supply, and it's really under pressure. I don't think that has happened in Wyoming before. This is really crunch time for a lot of the things that people really value in this state."

Environmental reporter Whitney Royster can be reached at (307) 734-0260 or at royster@tribcsp.com.