WYOMING, Mich. — Tryston Crain has been mowing lawns since he was a kid. He started with a couple of houses in his neighborhood, before turning it into a full fledged business.

Now, rising fuel prices are threatening to squeeze his small landscaping business — and potentially his customer’s wallets, too.

Crain started Crain Lawn and Landscape in high school, at the age of 16. Today, he serves more than 60 clients every week in the Wyoming area.

“I’m an owner operator with a couple guys that work with me on bigger projects, but primarily just myself,” Crain said.

With dozens of clients to serve, Crain and his crew make frequent trips to the gas pump — filling up trucks two to three times a week, on top of fueling their four mowers.

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I asked Crain what kind of impact rising fuel prices have had on his business.

“When you jump up $1 a gallon, that’s 30 gallons, three times a week. That’s $100 a week just for the truck, $400 a month, and you got the mowers on top of that. So, at this rate it’s almost $1,000 extra a month,” Crain said.

WATCH: Rising fuel costs are squeezing a Wyoming landscaping business — and customers could feel it soon

Rising fuel costs are squeezing a Wyoming landscaping business — and customers could feel it soon

That added cost is forcing Crain to pull money away from growing his business just to keep up with daily operations.

“When we go into budget, with what we want to spend on, you know, X, Y and Z, and we have to take out money that we would usually put into reinvesting, growing the business back into just our daily operations. It hurts us,” Crain said.

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Crain said he does not want to pass those costs on to his customers — but may have no choice if prices stay high.

“When they’re struggling with all their rising prices, you know, groceries on top of everything else, rent, gas, everything’s going up. So it’s just not something that I want to put on to them. But if it gets to a point where it keeps going up or stays this high for a while, it’s something that you might have to think about,” Crain said.

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DUBOIS, Wyo. — The Wyoming Game and Fish Department recently announced that, after consultation with the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, it successfully captured and relocated an adult male grizzly bear on April 25.

A release from Game and Fish says that the grizzly was captured for cattle depredation on private land in Park County. In cooperation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, as well as the Shoshone National Forest, the grizzly was relocated to the Wiggins Fork drainage, approximately 19 miles south of Dubois, Wyoming.

The release notes that grizzly bears are relocated in accordance with state and federal law and regulation, and Game and Fish is required to update the public whenever a grizzly bear is relocated.

“Grizzly bear relocation is a management tool large carnivore biologists use to minimize conflicts between humans and grizzly bears,” the release states. “Bears that are considered a threat to human safety are not relocated. In some cases, a bear may be removed from the population if it cannot be relocated successfully.”

The release says that capture is necessary when other deterrents or preventative options are exhausted or unattainable. Once the animal is captured, all circumstances are taken into account when determining if the grizzly should be relocated. If relocation is deemed necessary, a site is determined by considering the age, sex and type of conflict that the bear was involved in, as well as potential human activity near the location.

“Grizzly bears are only relocated into the recovery zone or adjacent areas,” the release states. “With any relocation, Game and Fish consults with appropriate agencies to minimize the chance of future conflicts and maximize the relocated grizzly bear’s survival.”

The Wyoming Game and Fish Department continues to stress the importance of the public’s responsibility when it comes to bear management and the importance of keeping all attractants — including food, garbage, horse feed and birdseed — unavailable to bears. Reducing attractants to bears reduces human–bear conflicts and, in some cases, relocation.

For more information on grizzly bear management and reducing the potential for conflicts, visit the Bear Wise Wyoming web page.

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