Montana is a state in the Mountain West division of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota and South Dakota to the east, Wyoming to the south, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columbia, and Saskatchewan to the north. It is the fourth-largest state by area, the eighth-least populous state, and the third-least densely populated state. Its state capital is Helena, while the largest city is Billings. The western half of Montana contains numerous mountain ranges, while the eastern half is characterized by western prairie terrain and badlands, with smaller mountain ranges found throughout the state. The state has a reputation for a libertarian bent in popular opinion and policy.
In the United States, a national monument is a protected area that can be created from any land owned or controlled by the federal government by proclamation of the President of the United States or an act of Congress. National monuments protect a wide variety of natural and historic resources, including sites of geologic, marine, archaeological, and cultural importance. In contrast, national parks in the U.S. must be created by Congressional legislation. Some national monuments were first created by presidential action and later designated as national parks by congressional approval.
Glacier National Park is an American national park located in northwestern Montana, on the Canada–United States border, adjacent to the Canadian provinces of Alberta and British Columbia. The park encompasses more than 1 million acres (4,000 km2) and includes parts of two mountain ranges, more than 130 named lakes, more than 1,000 different species of plants, and hundreds of species of animals. This vast pristine ecosystem is the centerpiece of what has been referred to as the "Crown of the Continent Ecosystem," a region of protected land encompassing 16,000 square miles (41,000 km2).
The Flathead Indian Reservation, located in western Montana on the Flathead River, is home to the Bitterroot Salish, Kootenai, and Pend d'Oreilles tribes – also known as the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Nation. The reservation was created through the July 16, 1855, Treaty of Hellgate.
The Flathead River, in the northwestern part of the U.S. state of Montana, originates in the Canadian Rockies to the north of Glacier National Park and flows southwest into Flathead Lake, then after a journey of 158 miles (254 km), empties into the Clark Fork. The river is part of the Columbia River drainage basin, as the Clark Fork is a tributary of the Pend Oreille River, a Columbia River tributary. With a drainage basin extending over 8,795 square miles (22,780 km2) and an average discharge of 11,380 cubic feet per second (322 m3/s), the Flathead is the largest tributary of the Clark Fork and constitutes over half of its flow.
The Bob Marshall Wilderness Area is a congressionally-designated wilderness area located in Western Montana region of the United States. It is named after Bob Marshall (1901–1939), an early forester in the federal government, conservationist, and co-founder of The Wilderness Society. In the 1930s while working for the Forest Service, Marshall was largely responsible for designation of large areas to be preserved as roadless within lands administered by the Forest Service; he achieved this through promulgation of various regulations. Formally designated in 1964, the Bob Marshall Wilderness extends for 60 miles (97 km) along the Continental Divide and consists of 1,009,356 acres (4,084.72 km2).
Wild Montana was founded by a group of Montana outfitters, ranchers, doctors, and friends. The organization is governed by a board of directors from across Montana, working at the local level through seven chapters in Helena, Bozeman, Missoula, Whitefish, Great Falls, Billings, and Butte. Each chapter is governed by a local board of directors. Since 1958, Wild Montana has worked to protect Montana's wilderness, wildlife habitat, and traditional recreation opportunities. The organization was instrumental in the passage of the 1964 Wilderness Act and in the designation of every Wilderness area in the state, like the Bob Marshall, Scapegoat, and Absaroka-Beartooth Wildernesses. It also helped win National Wild and Scenic Rivers System designations for the Missouri and Flathead rivers, and National Monument status for the Upper Missouri River Breaks.
The Sawtooth Wilderness is a federally-protected wilderness area that covers 217,088 acres (87,852 ha) of the state of Idaho. Managed by the U.S. Forest Service in the U.S. Department of Agriculture, it was designated the Sawtooth Primitive Area in 1937 to preserve the exceptional scenic beauty of the Sawtooth Mountains. On August 22, 1972 Public Law 92-400 designated the Primitive Area as the Sawtooth Wilderness and part of the newly created Sawtooth National Recreation Area. As part of the National Wilderness Preservation System, the Sawtooth Wilderness is an area where human development and use are restricted and people are to remain only visitors. According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, the Sawtooth Wilderness has some of the clearest air in the lower 48 states.
The National Wilderness Preservation System (NWPS) of the United States protects federally managed wilderness areas designated for preservation in their natural condition. Activity on formally designated wilderness areas is coordinated by the National Wilderness Preservation System. Wilderness areas are managed by four federal land management agencies: the National Park Service, the U.S. Forest Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Bureau of Land Management.
Height of the Rockies Provincial Park is a provincial park in the Canadian Rockies of south eastern British Columbia, Canada. It is located west of the Continental Divide, adjacent to Elk Lakes Provincial Park.
Cache Creek is an 87-mile-long (140 km) stream in Lake, Colusa and Yolo counties, California.
The Center for Biological Diversity is a nonprofit membership organization known for its work protecting endangered species through legal action, scientific petitions, creative media and grassroots activism. It was founded in 1989 by Kieran Suckling, Peter Galvin, Todd Schulke and Robin Silver. The center is based in Tucson, Arizona, with its headquarters in the historic Owls club building, and has offices and staff in New Mexico, Nevada, California, Oregon, Illinois, Minnesota, Alaska, Vermont, Florida and Washington, D.C.
A conservation officer is a law enforcement officer who protects wildlife and the environment. A conservation officer may also be referred to as an environmental technician or technologist, game warden, forest ranger, forest watcher, forest guard, forester, gamekeeper, investigator, wilderness officer, wildlife officer, or wildlife trooper.
The Florida black bear is a subspecies of the American black bear that has historically ranged throughout most of Florida and the southern portions of Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi. The large black-furred bears live mainly in forested areas and have seen recent habitat reduction throughout the state due to increased human development, as well as habitat modifications within bear habitat.
The U.S. state of Wyoming faces a broad array of environmental issues stemming from natural resource extraction, species extirpation, non-native species introduction, and pollution. Wildlife species that have been affected by these issues include:
The grizzly bear, also known as the North American brown bear or simply grizzly, is a population or subspecies of the brown bear inhabiting North America.
Operating as a nonprofit environmental land trust, The Vital Ground Foundation protects and restores North America's grizzly bear populations by conserving wildlife habitat. Founded in 1990, Vital Ground operates in the belief that the grizzly bear, an umbrella species, is nature's barometer of a healthy and complete ecosystem, and that conserving grizzly bears and their habitat is key to ensuring diverse and healthy landscapes.
Douglas H. Chadwick is an American wildlife biologist, author, photographer and frequent National Geographic contributor. He is the author of fourteen books and more than 200 articles on wildlife and wild places.
The North Fork Watershed Protection Act of 2013 is a bill that would withdraw 430,000 acres of federal lands in Montana from programs to develop geothermal and mineral resources. The law would forbid mountaintop removal mining and other natural resource development. The affected lands lie adjacent to Glacier National Park and already have some protections. The bill follows up on an agreement between Canada and the United States on how to protect the trans-border area from the effects of mining. In the 2010 agreement, Canada agreed not to do any additional mining on the British Columbian Flathead with the expectation that Montana would do the same thing to its land.
Thomas D. Mangelsen is an American nature and wildlife photographer and conservationist. He is most famous for his photography of wildlife in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, as he has lived inside the zone in Jackson, Wyoming, for over 40 years. In 2015, he and nature author Todd Wilkinson created a book, The Grizzlies of Pilgrim Creek, featuring a grizzly bear known as Grizzly 399, named so due to her research number. He has been active in the movement to keep the Yellowstone area grizzly bears on the Endangered Species List. Mangelsen is also known for trekking to all seven continents to photograph a diverse assortment of nature and wildlife. A photograph he took in 1988 titled, "Catch of the Day" has been labeled "the most famous wildlife photograph in the world". In May 2018, he was profiled on CBS 60 Minutes. He has received dozens of accolades throughout the decades.
