Dunoir Special Management Unit

The Dunoir Special Management Unit is a 29,719-acre area in the Absaroka Range on the Shoshone National Forest, Wyoming. The mountainous, montane terrain is anchored by the distinctive Pinnacle Buttes, with Du Noir Butte, Coffin Butte, Jules Bowl, and the broad meadows of Dundee Meadows and Basin Creek Meadows shaping the interior. Three high passes — Bonneville Pass, Shoshone Pass, and Bowles Pass — connect the area's drainages to neighboring basins. The Dunoir protects the headwaters of West Du Noir Creek (HUC12 100800010206) and East Du Noir Creek, fed by Boday Creek, Basin Creek, Grizzly Creek, Dundee Creek, Esmond Creek, Spruce Creek, Frozen Lake Creek, Trail Creek, Falls Creek, Bonneville Creek, and Cub Creek. The DuNoir Glacier persists at the highest elevations, and a chain of subalpine waters — Murray Lake, Watkins Lakes, Trail Lake, Clendenning Lake, Froms Lake, and Kisinger Lakes — punctuates the upper basins.

Vegetation arranges itself along a steep elevation gradient. Lower slopes carry Intermountain Mountain Sagebrush Steppe and Northern Rockies Foothill Shrubland with shrubby cinquefoil and big sagebrush. Mid-elevations support Central Rockies Douglas-fir Forest and Rocky Mountain Lodgepole Pine Forest dominated by lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta), with Rocky Mountain Aspen Forest pockets of quaking aspen. Upper slopes carry Rocky Mountain Dry and Wet Subalpine Spruce-Fir Forest with Engelmann spruce (Picea engelmannii) and subalpine fir over a carpet of grouseberry (Vaccinium scoparium). Northern Rockies Subalpine Woodland and Parkland and Rocky Mountain Limber and Bristlecone Pine Woodland hold whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis) and limber pine on wind-exposed ridges. Above timberline, Rocky Mountain Alpine Dwarf-Shrubland and Alpine Meadow support American bistort (Bistorta bistortoides), Parry's primrose (Primula parryi), and Rhexia-leaf Indian-paintbrush (Castilleja rhexiifolia). Riparian corridors host Rocky Mountain Subalpine Streamside Woodland with streamside bluebells (Mertensia ciliata), Lewis' monkeyflower (Erythranthe lewisii), and the tall white bog orchid (Platanthera dilatata).

The Dunoir supports a Greater Yellowstone large-mammal community. Grizzly bear (Ursus arctos horribilis) moves through forest and meadow; moose (Alces alces) browses streamside willow stands and Basin Creek Meadows; mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) uses the elevation gradient seasonally. Canada lynx (Lynx canadensis) hunts snowshoe-hare habitat in dense conifer cover, and North American wolverine (Gulo gulo luscus) crosses snowbound terrain across the high passes. Above timberline, the black rosy-finch (Leucosticte atrata) forages on snowfields and alpine seed heads. Golden eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) and bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) work the open ridgelines and basin lakes. The great gray owl (Strix nebulosa) hunts open meadow edges at dawn and dusk. Cassin's finch (Haemorhous cassinii), broad-tailed hummingbird (Selasphorus platycercus), and olive-sided flycatcher (Contopus cooperi) occupy conifer canopies. Western toad (Anaxyrus boreas) inhabits the saturated subalpine wetlands. Portions of this area fall within the potential range of several federally listed species; see the Conservation section for details.

A visitor crossing into the Dunoir over Togwotee Pass enters a basin walled by the sawtooth Pinnacle Buttes to the east. The trail down toward Trail Lake passes through subalpine spruce-fir, opens into the wildflower meadows of Basin Creek, and climbs again toward Bonneville Pass. Higher up, where the forest thins to whitebark krummholz, ravens carry across the rock, and the DuNoir Glacier holds snow into the late summer.

The Dunoir country lies on traditional Tukudika (Mountain Shoshone) homeland. The Tukudika, or Sheep Eater, Indians were a band of Mountain Shoshone that lived for thousands of years in the area that would become Yellowstone National Park [1]. The Tukudika were skilled hunters and artisans known for their horn bows, obsidian arrows and tools, stone-and-timber game and fish traps, sheepskin clothing, and steatite bowls [1]. They traveled in extended-family groups, hunting bighorn sheep on foot with the aid of dogs and using bows made from the same animal's horns [1]. Chief Togwotee was the Tukudika guide for President Chester A. Arthur's 1883 trip through Yellowstone; Togwotee Pass, the high gap immediately west of the Dunoir, bears his name [1]. By 1900, the Tukudika had been incorporated into the Eastern Shoshone tribe of the Wind River Reservation in central-western Wyoming, and into the Shoshone-Bannock tribes of the Fort Hall Reservation in southeastern Idaho [1]. Some descendants prefer the name Mountain People [1].

The Dunoir entered industrial use through the railroad tie industry. From the 1860s until the early 1940s, hand-hewn crossties were the basis of that industry [2]. Late in the fall of 1913, a crew of twenty workers headed to the timber northwest of Dubois; they built a base camp and began cutting ties in February 1914, first along Sheridan Creek and later DuNoir Creek on the north side of the Wind River [2]. The Wyoming Tie and Timber Company eventually established a tie camp at "the second DuNoir" on upper Warm Spring Creek, with a company store, post office, schoolhouse, blacksmith shop, and housing for a dozen families [2]. The five-mile V-shaped wooden flume that carried ties down Warm Spring Canyon to the Wind River was built in the summer and fall of 1928 [2]. The operation peaked in 1927 when 700,000 ties were driven down the Wind River; the flume was abandoned in 1942, and the final tie drive was held in 1946 [2]. Between 1914 and 1946, some ten million railroad ties had been treated at the Riverton tie yard [2].

A unique chapter in federal land management followed. On October 9, 1972, Public Law 92-476 designated the Washakie Wilderness in the Shoshone National Forest and created the Dunoir Special Management Unit as a separate designated area [3][4]. Public Law 92-476 directed the Forest Service to manage the Dunoir for primitive values without statutory wilderness status [4]. Management of the Dunoir Special Management Unit is described in section 5(a) of the Act [3]. The 29,719-acre area lies within the Wind River Ranger District, spanning Fremont, Park, and Teton counties at the headwaters of West Du Noir Creek. It is administered as an Inventoried Roadless Area protected both by its 1972 special designation and under the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule.

Vital Resources Protected

• Major Headwater and Subalpine Lake Integrity. The Dunoir contains the headwaters of West and East Du Noir Creek along with Boday, Basin, Grizzly, Dundee, Esmond, Spruce, Frozen Lake, Trail, Falls, Bonneville, and Cub Creeks, and a chain of subalpine waters including Trail Lake, Watkins Lakes, Murray Lake, Clendenning Lake, Froms Lake, and Kisinger Lakes. Discharge from the DuNoir Glacier feeds these systems through the snowmelt season. The unroaded condition holds sediment loads low and water temperatures cold, sustaining downstream aquatic habitat in the Wind River drainage.

• Subalpine Woodland Refugia for Whitebark Pine. Northern Rockies Subalpine Woodland and Parkland — habitat for federally threatened whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis) — covers 42.2% of the area's surface, the dominant ecosystem type. Unfragmented stands of whitebark pine on the wind-exposed ridges around Pinnacle Buttes, Du Noir Butte, and Coffin Butte provide seeds for Clark's nutcracker dispersal, grizzly-bear forage, and structural complexity that no managed stand replicates.

• Large-Carnivore Habitat in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. The 29,719-acre area provides unfragmented forest, meadow, and high-pass habitat that supports populations of Canada lynx (designated critical habitat), grizzly bear, and North American wolverine — three federally threatened mammals whose persistence depends on large unroaded landscapes. The Dunoir's high passes — Bonneville, Shoshone, and Bowles — function as movement corridors for these species between the Washakie Wilderness, the Teton Wilderness, and the broader Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.

Potential Effects of Road Construction

• Sedimentation, Channel Disturbance, and Wetland Loss. Road cut slopes in the steep Absaroka terrain would deliver chronic fine sediment into the West and East Du Noir headwaters, smothering spawning substrate and the aquatic invertebrate base in cold pools. Culverts at stream crossings fragment longitudinal connectivity, and fill or drainage works in the subalpine meadow systems around Dundee Meadows and Basin Creek Meadows disrupt the hydrology that supports the tall white bog orchid (Platanthera dilatata, IUCN-vulnerable) and western toad breeding ponds. Once disturbed, channel morphology and saturated meadow hydrology take decades to redevelop.

• Whitebark Pine Decline and Pathogen Spread. Road construction across the elevational gradient brings increased human access that has been linked to the spread of white pine blister rust (Cronartium ribicola), a non-native pathogen that has already caused serious decline in whitebark pine stands across the Rocky Mountain region. Because Subalpine Woodland and Parkland covers 42.2% of the Dunoir, accelerated rust spread would disproportionately compromise this area's dominant high-elevation community and the grizzly forage and Clark's nutcracker dispersal that depend on it.

• Loss of Wildlife Habitat Connectivity. Roads through subalpine forest sever the unfragmented blocks that Canada lynx, grizzly bear, and North American wolverine require. Increased human access along roads concentrates grizzly-human conflict mortality, and roads create movement barriers that interrupt seasonal migrations of moose, mule deer, and elk through the area's meadow systems. Roads also disrupt the high-pass connectivity that links the Dunoir to the Washakie and Teton Wildernesses — a connectivity that the 1972 Special Management Unit designation under Public Law 92-476 was specifically intended to preserve.

The Dunoir Special Management Unit offers backcountry recreation across 29,719 mountainous acres on the Shoshone National Forest. Thirteen maintained trails total approximately 80.5 miles of native-material tread. The South Fork Trail (809.2) is the longest at 26.7 miles, traversing the area on a long alignment. The DuNoir Trail (808) covers 11.0 miles as the primary access route along West Du Noir Creek; the South Fork Buffalo Trail (6053) — the only route open to both hikers and horses — runs 11.8 miles connecting to the adjacent Teton Wilderness. The Ramshorn Trail (819) covers 8.7 miles, the East Dunoir Trail (809.4A) covers 6.8 miles, the Kisinger Lakes Trail (807) covers 4.6 miles to the lake chain, and the Falls Creek Trail (835) covers 4.0 miles. Shorter connectors include the Wolf Creek Trail (808.2, 2.2 mi), Murray Lake Trail (808.1A, 1.3 mi), Watkins Lakes Trail (822, 1.2 mi), Perry N Boday Trail (808.3, 0.9 mi), Wolf Creek Cabin Cutoff (808.2A, 0.7 mi), and Murray Lake Cutoff (808.1B, 0.6 mi). All except the South Fork Buffalo Trail are designated for horse use only.

The Wolf Creek/DuNoir trailhead is the established entry point, accessed from U.S. Highway 26/287 near Togwotee Pass west of Dubois. There are no developed campgrounds within the area itself; dispersed camping is permitted under USFS guidelines, and pack-trip access into the heart of the Dunoir typically uses multi-day itineraries through Trail Lake, Kisinger Lakes, or over Bonneville Pass.

Hunting opportunities cover Wyoming Game and Fish big-game seasons. Wapiti (Cervus canadensis), moose (Alces alces), and mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) use the meadow-conifer mosaic across Dundee Meadows and Basin Creek Meadows. American black bear (Ursus americanus) hunting is regulated under bear-identification rules that distinguish black from grizzly bears, which are federally protected under the Endangered Species Act. Hunters must hold Wyoming Game and Fish licenses, observe hunt-area boundaries, and meet the state's requirement that nonresidents be accompanied by a licensed outfitter in wilderness-adjacent areas.

Anglers find native and stocked trout in the chain of subalpine lakes — Trail Lake, Watkins Lakes, Murray Lake, Clendenning Lake, Froms Lake, and Kisinger Lakes — and in the West and East Du Noir Creek headwaters. The DuNoir Glacier supplies cold meltwater to the upper streams through midsummer. A Wyoming fishing license is required, with creel and species regulations applying.

Two eBird hotspots within 24 km — Shoshone NF–Brooks Lake (97 species across 52 checklists) and Shoshone NF–Falls Campground (82 species, 67 checklists) — document the avifauna of the Togwotee Pass corridor. Inside the Dunoir, the great gray owl (Strix nebulosa) hunts meadow edges at dawn and dusk, and black-billed magpie (Pica hudsonia) ranges through forest openings.

Equestrian travel is the dominant mode of long-distance access. Outfitter operations have operated in the Dunoir since the tie-cutting era of the Wyoming Tie and Timber Company in the 1910s and 1920s. Photographers come for the sawtooth profile of the Pinnacle Buttes, the meadows of Dundee and Basin Creek, the cirque holding the DuNoir Glacier, and views from Bonneville and Shoshone passes.

Each of these activities depends on the area's unique protection. The 1972 Special Management Unit designation under Public Law 92-476 restricts mechanized use, and the area's roadless condition supports the federally threatened grizzly bear, Canada lynx, and wolverine populations that move through the high passes. Anglers reach mountain lakes on foot or horseback because no road network exists. Hunters find game in proper habitat because the area is not bisected by motorized routes. Birders and photographers find the high country in its current form. Road construction would shorten travel times but at the cost of the conditions Congress affirmed in 1972 and the conditions that distinguish the Dunoir today.