The Bureau of Land Management withdrew a 40-acre parcel in the Craig area from its May 11 auction, where about 170 parcels totaling nearly 197,000 acres will be up for bid. BLM spokeswoman Theresa Sauer said the agency will take another look at the site, where Craig wants to build boat ramps and develop a swim beach at the Elkhead Reservoir.

The parcel could be offered at a later oil and gas sale. The Craig City Council is formally protesting the proposed lease.

Environmentalists are protesting other leases, including a big swath of northwestern Colorado where 189 black-footed ferrets have been released since 2001 to restore the animal, one of the rarest in North America.

The quarterly auctions, mandated by law, have produced a growing number of protests as the number of parcels up for bid has increased and the rate of natural gas drilling has shot up. The February auction, which generated a record $11.8 million, ignited a furor in the western Colorado communities of Grand Junction and Palisade because their watersheds are among the 134,582 acres that were leased.

''We're thinking because of the scale of the last several protests, they're moving too fast,'' said Steve Smith of The Wilderness Society's regional office in Denver.

Environmentalists are protesting leases in areas proposed by various groups as federal wilderness. Protests trigger automatic reviews that put the sales on hold.

''The one observation is that they're overlooking or not giving sufficient attention to the other public values that these oil and gas leases have,'' Smith said.

BLM spokeswoman Sauer said the agency fully reviews the land that companies nominate for energy leases. The parcels have to be identified in management plans as appropriate for oil and gas development.