It's perhaps Wyoming's most ubiquitous image, gracing everything from state highway signs, state literature, the helmets of Wyoming Cowboy football players and even the front page of this newspaper every day.

Fact is, if you see Steamboat the horse and his gyrating rider, you can be assured that there's a Wyoming connection.

Seems the good folks in Rock Springs want to give the old state mascot a makeover fit for their city.

The Rock Springs Daily Rocket-Miner reported in its Feb. 29 edition of the city's plans to market a design for the city that looks eerily like the bucking horse and rider - on two wheels, however, instead of four legs.

The paper reported of the city's plans to market Rock Springs as the "Two Wheel Sports Capital of Wyoming." The new logo will be phased in with the city's existing signage and will be used to market such events as BMX racing and motocross, the paper reported.

The logo is specifically designed to lure people to the town, Mayor Tim Kaumo told the paper.

No word on whether they'll replace the logo rider's biking helmet with a cowboy hat.

The one that didn't get away

Anglers in Park County will be checking their lures twice now after the story Randy Merritt told the Cody Enterprise for the paper's Feb. 27 edition.

This fish story is actually about the one that didn't get away.

Merritt was ice fishing on Buffalo Bill Reservoir when he reeled in a 30-pound lake trout when he landed the big fish.

It was so big, the paper reported, that Merritt had to drill a bigger hole in the ice just to give the fish room to wriggle out of his hole.

The paper noted that the fish could be as much as 40 years old.

"It's kind of a once-in-a-lifetime deal," Merritt told the paper.

The fish measured 38 inches long and its girth at the dorsal fin was 24 inches, the paper noted.

It took 20 minutes and several battles to extract the fish once it bit on Merritt's line, the paper reported.

Merritt said he plans to mount a cast of the fish - right after he eats it.

"He'll be oily, but I'll eat him," he said.

Maybe he could ride Steamboat

Meet Shane Proctor, the "World's Toughest Cowboy."

So says the Fox Sports Network, which crowned the Powell man as such for winning the "World's Toughest Cowboy" competition, the Powell Tribune reported in its March 6 edition.

Proctor, 22, is a rodeo cowboy who has earned himself a tidy sum of money bucking bulls and the like.

To make it through the "Toughest" competition, Proctor had to face an elimination round of sorts, where 18 cowboys were whittled to one. The final four competitors, the paper reported, had to compete on saddle broncs, bareback and bulls.

Proctor has been a rodeo cowboy since he was 13, the paper reported.

Asked how she feels sometimes when he's just come out of the chute, and his girlfriend, Kori Cross, gets nervous.

"I pretty much bite my fingernails off," she told the paper.

Think we oughta give this cowpoke a try?

Man and Mother Nature mix

Spend any time around the winter wildlife closure area 29 near Jackson this year, and you might see something that could make you jump.

Seems a mountain lion likes to get a bit close with some humans, who have taken to viewing this big cat as it works a feast of mule deer, day after day after day, the Jackson Hole News and Guide reported in its March 5 edition.

Seems the cat was oblivious to the humans gathering nearby.

"In the last bit of light (one day), it came down and walked down to the carcass," Game and Fish spokesman Mark Gocke told the paper. "It was really interesting to watch. The behaviors are just so similar to your cat at home."

Um, well, maybe, but with much bigger teeth. And paws. And claws.

In one week, the cat gave spectators, in a sense, dinner (for the cat) and a movie (for the public). By March 1, the cat was gone.

It's the third time in a decade that cats have come so close to humans in the winter, the paper reported.

How you can spot a small town…

In a week filled with stories of leap-year births and birthdays, here's how you can tell you live in a small town, simply because it can take a while for these things to happen. The Dubois Frontier reported in its March 6 edition of the first baby of the year born in the Dubois/Crowheart area. Tom Henry and Hana Collins of Crowheart welcomed Calden Mattew Collins into the world on Feb. 18, a full 49 days after the start of the new year.

Got an item or tip for this column? Contact night editor David Mirhadi at (307) 266-0616 or david.mirhadi@trib.com