Daniel Schwab on Conserving Wildlife Migrations in the West

With evolving technology and new research, scientists, conservationists, policymakers, and other stakeholders better understand how migratory behavior is vital in maintaining healthy and abundant ungulate populations, significantly benefiting humans.

The science of wildlife migration has advanced at a rapid pace over the past decade, although much remains to be learned about this phenomenon across the western U.S. Tens of thousands of data points now accumulate daily, adding to the knowledge about how and when deer, elk, pronghorn, and other large mammals move to migrate.

This data provides the foundation for policy and management decisions at all levels of government that can best conserve migrating wildlife. By identifying the routes that animals use and the timing of their journeys, management strategies can be tailored to maintain ancient wildlife pathways.

Migrating wildlife faces diverse challenges. Land use trends in the West, particularly in rural areas, almost always result in habitat loss and fragmentation. Because migration routes span miles across multiple jurisdictions, stakeholders must create a range of solutions rather than a single tool. Fortunately, these solutions already exist. Some include conserving a given migration with a bridge across a highway, an exclusion zone for new energy development, or a county land use plan incorporating wildlife movement areas.

The science is precise, and solutions exist. All that remains is for the various stakeholders to embrace those solutions. When established together, science and action can provide a bright future for migrating wildlife in the West.

About Daniel Schwab

Daniel Schwab is a seasoned businessman and well-liked local figure living in Afton, Wyoming. Daniel has always been mesmerized by the surrounding environment. Daniel's parents and grandparents taught him how to hunt and fly fish, which deepened his love and respect for all living things. His enthusiasm for the great outdoors grew due to the many years he invested in the scouting program and earned the Eagle Scout rank. His dedication to preserving the environment motivates his professional and personal endeavors years later.

Daniel Schwab studied business and finance at Utah State University. After graduating from college, he started several successful start-up companies, one focused on restoring fish and animal habitats on ranchlands. He is aware of the significance of these spring streams to the environment and the habitat of fish breeding. He used to play with fingerlings in the spring streams in his backyard when he was younger. As he observed the local farmers and ranchers' poor land management practices, such as overgrazing the land and allowing the cattle to deface the stream banks and contaminate the water supply, Daniel began to realize that there had to be a better way to protect the spring streams and the surrounding environment.

In 1997, he joined forces with some of the wealthiest business people in the nation, and his firm began purchasing run-down ranches in Wyoming and Idaho. Daniel Schwab then hired experts to help with securing authorizations and formulating and carrying out plans for the preservation and rehabilitation of the property.

Only a few years later, in 2002, Daniel's firms had over 100,000 acres under state and BLM leases and more than 30,000 acres of deeded land, some of Wyoming's most expensive real estate. After discovering the new concept of conservation banking while researching different conservation initiatives, he surrounded himself with the nation's most significant conservation bank specialists. The Terrawest Conservancy was established by Daniel, a business specializing in creating conservation banks and enabling landowners to rescue threatened animals and their surroundings. Daniel wants to use conservation to make the wildlife, fisheries, and people who value them more prosperous in the Intermountain West.

Daniel Schwab is the owner of Terrawest Conservancy, a prestigious private fly-fishing club in Jackson Hole, as well as Feathered Hook of Jackson Hole and Renegade Wyoming, a conservation-based in-holding of property in the Bridger-Teton National Forest that provides homesites in a swanky fly-in community at the southern end of the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem.