The Lake Pend Orielle School District has improved its outdoor learning opportunities thanks to Kaniksu Land Trust, the Land Trust Alliance and other project partners.

KLT helped two elementary schools purchase tents to help outdoor learning and to assist schools cope with the COVID pandemic.

From the Bonner County Daily Bee article:

The reason for the outdoor spaces is twofold, Katie Cox, KLT executive director, said. In part, it is to reduce transmission risks for children who are in class. Many of the classrooms don’t have good ventilation, she said, which could increase students’ and teachers’ risk of catching COVID-19.

The outdoor classrooms are also a benefit to students academically, she said. LPOSD teachers have reported students generally behave and focus better in outdoor settings, Cox said, and there is increased attendance on days when there is outdoor learning.

Dave Kretzschmar, KLT education director, works to assemble one of the outdoor learning tents Tuesday afternoon at Farmin-Stidwell Elementary School. Photo by RACHEL SUN

     Gallatin Valley Land Trust has finalized its 114th conservation easement, a donated easement along the Yellowstone River in the Paradise Valley.

     From a GVLT Facebook post:

     This is our fifth conservation project with visionary rancher Tim Solso. The new donated conservation easement is adjacent to his 590 acre protected ranch and is situated on a steep bluff overlooking the Yellowstone River. If you’ve spent any time in Paradise Valley, you’ve no doubt enjoyed the protected scenic viewshed of Solso’s Legacy Ranch between Mallards Rest and Lock Leven on the Yellowstone River. An old dilapidated home will be removed from the parcel and management will be incorporated into the larger ranch, providing unobstructed views of the Absaroka Mountains for every floater or fisherman on the river and every driver or passenger on US 89-South. Thank you so much for the generosity of the Solso Family and Legacy Ranch  for helping us protect this highly scenic and important ranch in perpetuity.

     Conni and Craig French, ranchers in north central Montana, have received the 2020 Montana Leopold Conservation Award, and among the ways they are recognized is a really well done five minute video available on The Nature Conservancy in Montana’s Facebook page (Oct. 5. Post). Conni is a TNC Montana Trustee.

     The video opens with some dramatic drone footage of the French’s C Lazy J Ranch near Malta, and both Conni  and Craig do an excellent job of explaining their vision of stewardship and holistic ranch management.

     The Leopold Conservation Award is one of the country’s most prestigious conservation awards. Congratulations to the French family!

Prickly Pear Land Trust and project partners – City of Helena, Department of Defense, onX Maps, and supportive landowners – have worked together to add 54 key acres of public land for local outdoor recreation at Mount Helena.

“It’s another really awesome addition to Helena’s South Hills and the public lands we all own,” said Mary Hollow, PPLT executive director.

Contractors have spent the last few months doing fuels mitigation and other work on the property, and both Hollow and Helena Public Lands Director Kristi Ponozzo praised the Grahams (landowners) for their care of the 54 acres.

“This kind of work is only possible with the partnerships, the strong partnerships that Prickly Pear Land Trust has built with the city of Helena and with the department (of Defense),” Hollow said. “We have really strong relationships with the Montana Army National Guard that have been beneficial for our service members and civilians alike and I think especially in these times projects like these are places where people can come together.

by Brian Ohs, Montana ALE Program Coordinator

     The USDA/NRCS fiscal year ended on Sept. 30, and MALT members are well aware of the challenges that new NRCS policies and guidance presented for the Montana ALE program throughout the year. Add to that, the unique challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic, which needs no explanation.

     So, it seems appropriate to give a tip-of-the-hat to the participating land trusts for their tireless efforts to overcome these obstacles for their 2020 ALE applications. It is also fitting to give a big thank you to Tom Watson, Allen Persinger, Jeff Combs, Abby Rokosch, and to the entire NRCS state and national easement teams for their undaunted efforts as well. (Ed Note: Thanks to Brian Ohs as well.) Special thanks to Regan Anderson, an Agriculture Program Specialist at FSA, who led the effort to ensure individual project AGI compliance.

     MALT is proud to report that during FY20, thanks to the partnership with the NRCS, together in Montana we closed 12 easements, totaling 29,996 acres, which ranks Montana number one in the nation for conserved acres. Furthermore, thanks to the state and national NRCS, received funding for the land trust community to pursue 17 ALE projects in FY20, which will conserve 63,347 acres, also number one in the nation. Not a bad year in the saddle, all things considered.

     These results demonstrate the strength and value of the NRCS / MALT / Montana landowners partnership to achieve agricultural conservation for the benefit of Montana open land, Montana’s rural communities, Montana agriculture and Montana farm and ranch families.   

An article in the Flathead Beacon sheds light on the continuing problem of Montana and US agriculture producers surviving the COVID pandemic.

From the article: A few months ago, millions of pounds of potatoes across Montana were either buried or donated, says Ben Thomas, the director of the Montana Department of Agriculture.

“We have a very strong seed potato industry and the impact on the restaurant scene had a huge impact on food supply,” Thomas said. “We ended up with millions of seed potatoes that were not able to find their market.”

The barley industry was also impacted with bars and restaurants closed, Thomas said. Much of Montana’s barley winds up in Mexico where it’s used to make beer. And many of those contracts were canceled when Mexico’s breweries completely shut down right when the pandemic hit. While the barley is currently in storage, Thomas hopes those contracts will be renewed soon, but for now much of the barley is sitting idle.

Despite the market, Thomas says Montana’s crops did well this year after early spring moisture and limited hail.

“I think the general consensus from a production standpoint is it was a phenomenal year,” he said. “We had really high quality crops and really great growing conditions.”

But with record grain, lentil and chickpea yields, Thomas says that much of it is going into storage with declining market prices.

“Crops were great, prices were not,” Thomas said.

Shepherd, Montana rancher Steve Charter has a message for Montana and America…”independent agriculture is in crisis, with corporate monopolies threatening to drown family operations like a massive flood fueled by boardroom greed, legalized corruption, and legislative inaction. The COVID pandemic has only heightened these problems, further disrupting markets, supply chains, and food safety. Not only are the livelihoods of family operations under threat, the coronavirus has demonstrated the dire vulnerability of our nation’s food security as a whole. As with any crisis, however, we can seize this opportunity to make meaningful change.”

Food supply, food distribution, and food security are issues in America, made worse by the COVID pandemic. Montana and US agriculture are threatened and jeopardized on many fronts, and one of them is meat-packing monopolies. Charter has some ideas to address that, and explains why it is vitally important we do that.

     The US Fish & Wildlife Service is reporting a productive FY20 in Montana, with 37,000 acres of closed conservation easements and fee acquisitions valued at $17 million, including projects in places like the Little Valley Ranch (pictured) north of Avon on Highway 141.

     Other projects highlighted by the USFWS in Montana include projects near Choteau, in the Blackfoot Valley, at Red Rocks National Wildlife Refuge, and the Charles M. Russell National Wildlife Refuge. Major ongoing USWFS projects in FY20 include work with The Trust for Public Land and Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks on the Lost Trail Conservation Area proposal.

     In addition to landowners, FWP and TPL, major partners and funding sources for the USFWS in FY20 include the North American Wetlands Conservation Act, Ducks Unlimited, The Nature Conservancy and The Conservation Fund.

     The important role of conservation easement monitoring and stewardship was the focus of a recent article in the The Forest Steward’s Journal, a publication produced by the Forest Stewardship Foundation. The article, written by MALT’s Glenn Marx, highlights the importance of conservation easement monitoring – particularly forested lands held under easement – from the perspective of a land steward, a landowner and two different land trusts.

     Andrea “Andy” Darling, a Montana Land Reliance steward, a natural resources consultant, and a Forest Stewardship Foundation board member, explains in the article how she and the MLR approach monitoring and working with landowners on conservation easement monitoring and compliance, and how active forest management is consistent with forest health objectives within the easement.

     Ed Levert, a longtime forest leader in Montana and president of the Forest Stewardship Foundation, also discusses his forest property in northwest Montana. Levert says that he effectively and successfully manages his forest under a conservation easement – that he helped write – held by The Vital Ground Foundation.

     “The relationship between me and Vital Ground is fully cooperative and has been from the very beginning,” Levert says in the article. “There’s been education for both of us through the process, and they’ve been receptive of my ideas and management goals.”

     “Ed helped Vital Ground design language for our easement templates that recognizes and accommodates the needs of forest landowners and forest management,” Ryan Lutey of Vital Ground says in the article. “Both Ed and Bud Moore (legendary forest manager and author of “The Lochsa Story – Land Ethics in the Bitterroot Mountains”) helped shape the organization’s philosophy on active forest management as a transient disruption that, when done correctly, ultimately improves forest health and benefits many of the conservation values our easements are designed to protect.”

The Vital Ground Foundation, a regional land trust based in Missoula, has partnered with the Blackfeet Nation to conserve 74 acres of important wildlife habitat along Kennedy Creek east of Glacier National Park.

A nonprofit land trust that protects key movement areas for grizzly bears and other wildlife, Vital Ground purchased the acreage before immediately transferring ownership to the Blackfeet Nation. Previously a private inholding surrounded by tribal lands, the site provides habitat lush with conifers, aspen and other vegetation, leading to heavy traffic from grizzly bears and other species.

Kennedy Creek flows from mountain headwaters in Glacier National Park through the project area, passing near Yellow Mountain and Chief Mountain, a prominent sacred site in Blackfeet cultural traditions.

“I am very pleased that Vital Ground was able to partner with the Blackfeet Nation to protect the ecological integrity of the Chief Mountain-Yellow Mountain area,” said Buzz Cobell, Director of Blackfeet Nation Fish and Wildlife. “Kennedy Creek is inhabited by one of the few populations of bull trout existing on the east slope of the Rocky Mountains. In addition, this area is used extensively by grizzly bears, moose, elk, deer and other important wildlife species. Thanks to our collaborative efforts this special area will continue to be wild and undeveloped.”

“Protecting this irreplaceable wildlife habitat at the footsteps of Glacier National Park fits squarely within our One Landscape strategy,” said Vital Ground Conservation Manager Mitch Doherty. “But this project goes beyond protecting land for wildlife. Working with members of the Blackfeet Nation, Vital Ground was able to return this land to the people who have been caring for it since time immemorial.”