BLM lease sale nets more than $5.8M

All but 13 of 149 parcels offered for lease in Wyoming this month drew bids as $5,859,254 was collected from successful bidders. The highest bonus bid was $1,191,320 for a parcel totaling 2,054 acres in Sweetwater County. That went to Jerry Ryan of Denver. Highest price per acre was $1,110, on a parcel of 643 acres in Carbon County. Donald B. Anderson Ltd. of Englewood, Colo., got that lease. Leases on just over 100,000 acres were sold, out of roughly 117,000 acres. Average bid per acre was $56.88. The 13 parcels that didn’t receive bids are available for the yearly rental fee of $1.50 per acre. The state of Wyoming gets half of the proceeds collected by BLM. The oral auction was held Dec. 2 in Cheyenne.