Independently reported news stories of Montana's people, land, water and wildlife.
Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks wants elk hunters to have a little more opportunity in western Montana.
On Thursday, the FWP Commission tentatively approved a proposal to increase elk population objectives in areas of the Bitterroot, Swan, Middle and South Fork of the Flathead rivers and the Bob Marshall Wilderness.
Read MoreThe surveyors have finished their work, but it will be another month before it’s known to what extent the Wilks brothers trespassed on federal property in eastern Montana.
On Tuesday, a Federal Register notice announced that survey plats delineating Bureau of Land Management property in the Durfee Hills were finally available.
Read MoreI have returned refreshed, but my trip did nothing to reduce my concern over what climate change is doing to Montana and the planet.
I hiked in on the Rocky Mountain Front south of Glacier National Park near Dupuyer. We had high temperatures of mid-80s going in and the heat increased each day. But the 90-plus temperatures that Montana has endured since June have already taken their toll.
Read MoreThe federal government must quickly establish a timeline for its decision on whether a Louisiana oil and gas company can drill on a lease near the Blackfeet Reservation, according to a federal judge.
On Monday, District of Columbia federal district Judge Richard Leon ordered the Department of the Interior to finalize its timeline for deciding whether Solenex, LLC, can drill an exploratory well within a 6,247-acre lease in the Badger-Two Medicine region.
Read MoreOne should never get too excited when bills are introduced because the Congressional process often takes years to produce a law. But sportsmen’s groups think they could finally score with a new attempt at a bipartisan bill that includes a Montana-made proposal.
On Thursday, four House representatives introduced H.R. 3173, the “Sportsmen’s Conservation and Outdoor Recreation Enhancement Act,” otherwise known as SCORE, which would create or renew seven programs that benefit sportsmen, recreationalists and wildlife.
Read MoreMontana has taken a unique step toward conserving a bird that has much of the West scrambling to head off an endangered species listing.
On Monday, Gov. Steve Bullock signed an agreement with the U.S. Department of Agriculture Natural Resources Conservation Service and the Soil and Water Conservation Districts of Montana, Inc. to streamline funding for private efforts to conserve sagebrush on Montana’s rangelands.
The memorandum of understanding, the first of its kind in the West, seeks to focus conservation efforts on priority habitat and make it easier for Montana landowners to get a portion of the federal money set aside for sage grouse conservation.
Read MoreWhile favoring the concept of a land swap, an advisory committee stopped short of approving a new Wilks brothers proposal to trade parts of their property for landlocked federal parcels in eastern Montana.
On Thursday, the Bureau of Land Management Central Resource Advisory Council finished up a two-day meeting in Lewistown by passing a motion to consider the concept of a land swap as an alternative to building a new road to access the Bullwacker area near the Upper Missouri Breaks National Monument.
Read MoreAlthough it’s short, a new bypass road has a long history and goes a long way toward reopening part of the Custer Gallatin National Forest south of Big Timber.
On Wednesday morning, the new 1.6-mile section of the West Deer Creek Road was opened to the public, ending a 25-year struggle over access on the nearby Cherry Creek Road.
Read MoreTwo Texas billionaires are taking a second stab at trading part of their Montana property for federal inholdings, but this time, they’re offering hunters access to much of their land.
On Friday, Darryl James, spokesman for Dan and Farris Wilks, released a draft of a land-exchange proposal developed during two recent roundtable meetings between the Wilks brothers, Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks, and 13 sportsmen’s, landowner’s, conservation and agricultural organizations. The most recent roundtable met on Thursday.
Read MoreTo avoid an extended lawsuit, the Fish, Wildlife & Parks Commission has approved more stringent bobcat-trapping rules to avoid accidental capture of endangered Canada lynx. But it wasn’t a unanimous or easy vote.
During Thursday’s discussion of furbearer quotas, the FWP commission debated whether to accept trap specifications outlined in a February court settlement between FWP and three environmental groups.
Read MoreA Canadian company wants to mine the Treasure State, but the sites it wants to develop are next to another treasure: Yellowstone National Park. That’s raised concerns for some, especially those that live and work on the Yellowstone River.
For the next week, the Custer Gallatin National Forest and the Montana Department of Environmental Quality are requesting public input on a proposal to explore the gold deposits in the mountains southeast of Emigrant and Chico Hot Springs in the Paradise Valley.
Read MoreManaging wildlife is challenging when animals roam onto land where biologists cannot follow. Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks increasingly finds itself in that situation when dealing with wildlife and private property.
Often, the best way to find workable solutions is to bring the interested parties to the table. So Gov. Steve Bullock is seeking landowners, hunters, anglers, outfitters and others interested in wildlife issues who are interested in a 2-year appointment to the Private Lands/Public Wildlife Council.
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Lead-laced silt is revealed at the back of the Mike Horse Mine impoundment as DEQ crews work to remove the 1940s-era structure. Photo by Laura Lundquist
Montana is loaded with mining operations that have gone awry, leaving the state to deal with toxic waste and contaminated water. The copper mines of Butte and the Zortman-Landusky Mine near the Fort Belknap Reservation are two of the more egregious cases. But a small 1940s-era lead mine near Rogers Pass has its own notoriety.
In 1975, the Mike Horse Mine impoundment failed in the headwaters above Lincoln, causing 200,000 cubic yards of toxic waste to slide down the canyon and into the upper reach of the Blackfoot River. Four decades on, scientists still find traces of lead and zinc from the mine in the river, and fishermen complain that trout populations have not fully recovered.
For about the past decade, the Montana Department of Environmental Quality and the U.S. Forest Service have worked in fits and starts to reclaim the Mike Horse Mine and the spill area below. This summer, the derelict impoundment is being demolished.
Read more in my story on the DEQ reclamation and the mine's history here.
Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks has a goal of establishing five new wild sheep herds by 2022. But it's struggling to maintain the herds it has in the face of disease carried by domestic sheep.
In recent years, a number of wild herds have suffered major die-offs over the course of a single year, as sheep succumb to pneumonia. Those that survive may have a certain level of immunity, but their lambs often die, possibly infected by their own parents. As a result, the herd slowly dwindles.
How useless a death then, when a healthy lamb is killed by a careless driver. That's happened repeatedly in the Rock Creek Canyon east of Missoula, where some homeowners and an increasing number of anglers and visitors - many from out of state - escape to the woods and the river.
It's a challenge for a wildlife agency that can do little more than put up caution signs.
Read more in my story here.
For the past week, the jet stream has forced Montana to resemble Arizona, prompting several fireworks and fishing restrictions.
High temperature records for the end of June have been blown out of the water in Montana, especially in the western part of the state. The heat settled over Washington, Idaho and Montana over the weekend, and temperatures 10 to 15 degrees above normal should last at least until Sunday.
Read MoreThe Dood abides but no longer within Fish, Wildlife & Parks.
Tuesday was the last day of a 40-year career in FWP for threatened and endangered species coordinator Arne Dood.
Read MoreTwo more trumpeter swans grace the waters of the Blackfoot Valley, although they were a little hesitant to dive into freedom, maybe sensing the responsibility they carry.
Honking like Ford Model T’s and waving their splayed black feet, two yearling trumpeter swans were carried to the edge of Jones Lake, where volunteers gently placed them in the water on Saturday.
But rather than swimming away as their predecessors have done, the birds started waddling back toward their cages and the crowd of a dozen or so onlookers.
Finally encouraged to return to the water, they swam out to follow more than 165 other swans that have been released on the lake over the past decade, thanks to a partnership led by the Blackfoot Challenge.
Read MoreRiver levels are dropping rapidly as summer temperatures continue to climb, and both trends spell trouble for Montana’s trout. As Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks prepares for fishing closures, anglers can do some things to help fish out.
By Saturday, high temperatures are predicted to top 100 degrees and stay that way at least through Wednesday for parts of western Montana. That’s 20 to 25 degrees above normal for this time of year and the extended heat wave will break records, according to the National Weather Service. It's a preview of what summers may become due to climate change.
Even worse, the nighttime lows are predicted to barely sink into the 60s, so there won’t be much relief.
While some Montanans can escape to air-conditioned houses, wildlife that aren’t adapted to such hot weather are in for a miserable week.
Read MoreA legislative audit has taken Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks to task for a lack of consistency and oversight in carrying out a program to reduce game damage to property.
On Tuesday, state auditor Joe Murray explained the 11 problems he and his staff found with FWP’s game-damage program based upon almost 600 landowner requests made over the past five years.
Read MoreMissoula is home to Rattlesnake Creek, and now more people are becoming aware that it's also home to a few rattlesnakes.
The Missoula office of Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks has recently received several calls about rattlesnakes around Missoula.
Some of the callers were obviously concerned, and some have expressed surprise to find rattlesnakes in the area. But southwestern Montana - particularly in the Clark Fork, Bitterroot and lower Flathead river valleys - and the area east of the Continental Divide have always been home to prairie rattlesnakes.
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