Prickly Pear Land Trust’s Sevenmile Creek restoration project continues to deliver impressive results. From a PPLT social media post: PPLT’s restoration of 45 acres of floodplain and wetland ecosystem on Sevenmile Creek increased the storage capacity of the stream by almost 22 Olympic-sized swimming pools. Because of the restoration of wetlands and the floodplain on Sevenmile Creek, all of this water will be soaked into the ground and not sent flowing towards hundreds of homes and businesses in the Helena Valley during a large spring rain event.                                  

Photo Credit @elizaphoto406

      The Heart of the Rockies Initiative is alerting land trusts and others about a possible funding opportunity through the 2022 Montana Tourism Grant Program.

     The tourism grant funds are designed to improve tourism and recreation sites and experiences for non-resident visitors. The program is fairly flexible, and Erin Ferris-Olsen, HOTR Rural Development Director, and Emma Gjullin, HOTR Development & Communications Assistant, can provide additional information about the program.     

     The grant application window opened on August 1 and closes on Sept. 15.  

A recent Bozeman Daily Chronicle editorial salutes the value of open land conservation to Bozeman and the Gallatin Valley.

From. the editorial:

Western states still have an opportunity to preserve some of what’s best about their landscapes. But Montana isn’t likely to enact much in the way of statewide planning in the near term.

That’s why private-sector efforts like those of the GVLT (Gallatin Valley Land Trust) are so important. With the cooperation of willing landowners, the organization has been successful using the free market to preserve significant amounts of open space. But as population growth accelerates, much more needs to be done.

      Five Valleys Land Trust and Paraic & Becky Neibergs have teamed up to expand a previous conservation easement on Blackfoot Valley Neibergs property to a total of 436 acres through an effort named the Patterson Prairie Project.

     The Neibergs recently donated an additional 120-acre easement to an existing 315-acre easement, and also donated the project transaction costs. Additional community support enabled Five Valleys to complete project due diligence and facilitation. Five Valleys extended its gratitude to the Neibergs and organization supporters for helping them protect more of “this wild, interconnected, and scenic place.”

     A Five Valleys website report details the history of the property and the conservation values of the additional acres. From the website: The property lies between Ovando and Lincoln, just north of both the Blackfoot River and Highway 200. This location makes it both more vulnerable to potential development, as well as important for wildlife as they cross the highway coming to and from the river. And wildlife there is: everything from elk, moose, and turkeys to black and grizzly bears, lynx, wolves, and numerous smaller birds and mammals.                                                                  Five Valleys photo

Partnerships are key to the Vital Ground Foundation, and those partnerships are now prominent on the Vital Ground website. The website page salutes conservation partners, business partners, creative partners and landowner partners.

      The 2023 Farm Bill may seem like it’s far into the future, but the Land Trust Alliance is leading an effort right now to identify and galvanize land trust consensus on a range of potential issues associated with 2023 Farm Bill provisions.

     Even as the Alliance, the Partnership of Rangeland Trusts, and others are currently working behind the scenes to possibly secure additional ACEP/ALE funding within a much-discussed congressional infrastructure package, work continues between the Alliance and land trust leaders, congressional staff, key Members of Congress and others on important provisions within the 2023 Farm Bill.

     The Alliance’s policy director, Lori Faeth, led a national land trust call on July 22 that highlighted some of the major goals and ongoing issues associated with Farm Bill reauthorization. 

      Among the goals: 

      * Ensure ACEP/ALE is properly funded

      * Create a new program to conserve forestlands

      * Ensure program flexibility for land trusts and landowners

      * Maintain strong and flexible RCPP

      * Greater access to ACEP in underserved communities and disadvantaged landowners 

      * Possible elimination of AGI requirements  

      * Refine buy-protect-sell language 

      * Ensure ALE Plan is not reestablished 

      * Clarify language about certified entities 

      The 2023 Farm Bill is a work in progress, but progress is being made and most of the Alliance Farm Bill goals align themselves closely with MALT Farm Bill goals. MALT’s top 2023 Farm Bill priority is additional ACEP / ALE funding. Right now, for FY21, Montana’s ALE funding allocation is about $20 million short of full funding for qualified projects. The NRCS has thankfully worked—and continues to work—to address that shortfall. But the national need for additional ACEP / ALE funding is chronic, and the 2023 Farm Bill is an ideal place to address that issue. 

by Glenn Marx, MALT Executive Director

     It’s officially official: The MALT board of directors has finalized the MALT executive director job description, and an active search for MALT’s next executive director is now underway. I’ll be retiring within a March 2022 timeframe and someone new, with new ideas and new energy, will serve the land trust community as MALT executive director.

     I’ve had the honor, and the good fortune, to have this job since 2006, after I’d interviewed with a MALT hiring committee consisting of (at the time) Bill Long, MLR; Andy Baur, PPLT; Wendy Ninteman, FVLT; and Paul Sihler, HOTR. I was hired under an informal two-year agreement that was never formalized. As long as MALT kept paying me I kept showing up for work, and here we are, 15 years later. I’ll be riding off into the sunset and MALT will have a terrific opportunity to work with a new executive director on a new vision, and new creative ways to serve the MALT membership with new and perhaps more youthful enthusiasm.

The position is now listed on MALT’s website.

      Great things are going on in the Montana land trust community. For example, take a look at Flathead Land Trust: FLT’s major summer fundraising event is coming up live and in-person on August 19, FLT is a participant in the popular Great Fish Community Challenge, a major FLT partnership effort—Bad Rock Canyon Conservation Project—recently received a $15,000 donation from the Whitefish Community Foundation, FLT just led a successful tour of its Stillwater Conservation Easement project and its Somers Beach project is progressing. 

     Wow. 

     “We are so excited and grateful to the Whitefish Community Foundation for this grant,” Flathead Land Trust executive director Paul Travis said in a Flathead Beacon article. “The proposed Bad Rock Canyon Wildlife Management Area will protect a critical piece of wildlife habitat along the Flathead River and secure  public access to a wild place right on the doorstep of Columbia Falls.”

     A total of 61 Flathead area nonprofits were selected by the Whitefish Community Foundation for the Great Fish Community Challenge. The event features an August 5 launch party. Since 2015, the Great Fish Community Challenge has raised more than $13 million for more than 70 local nonprofit organizations. In addition to awarding a percentage match on the first $20,000 raised by each organization, the Whitefish Community Foundation awards thousands of dollars in incentive grants throughout the campaign.

     FLT is also hosting The Land Affair, the land trust’s annual summer fundraising event, at 6:00 PM on August 19. The event will be held at the Snowline Acres Ashley Creek Venue and features reggae music, locally-sourced appetizers, local beer and wine, all culminated with a live paddle raise.  

     A Kalispell Daily Inter Lake reporter joined FLT for a tour of its 1,100-acre Stillwater Conservation Easement, a collaborative project involving The Trust for Public Land, Stoltze Land & Lumber, and a previous conservation-minded  landowner on forested land about 18 miles north of Whitefish. 

     “It’s one of the last pieces of private land in that area,” FLT’s Paul Travis said at the time the deal was closed. “The conservation easement protects open space, public access and wildlife habitat while also allowing for sustainable timber management.”

Photo: Stillwater tour.

Five Valleys Land Trust is very pleased to report it has opened a new trail on Mount Dean Stone. From the Five Valleys website: The City of Missoula, Five Valleys and the Mount Dean Stone Committee partners are excited to announce that the nicknamed High, Wide and Handsome Trail on Mount Dean Stone is now open to the public! This milestone is the culmination of years of listening to community needs and working with private landowners, neighbors, the City of Missoula, and the Mount Dean Stone Committee to help create Missoula’s newest trail corridor and open space vista.

     The Nature Conservancy in Montana added some helpful updated information on its website about the importance of forest management, and forest use by recreationists, with links to other current forest management information.

     Montana TNC is a major forest landowner in western Montana, and an advisory on TNC’s website reads: This summer we expect to see huge numbers of people enjoying Montana’s outdoors, including visits to our TNC lands. With so many of us out there, please remember to douse your campfires, pack out trash, stay on marked trails and leave no trace that you were there. Folks accessing TNC’s lands are also encouraged to review TNC’s Forest Lands – Open Lands Policy. 

     That’s wise advice, given the number of wildfires burning in Montana, and the high percentage of them that have been human-caused. 

     TNC’s Summer 2021 Montana Forest Newsletter is full of interesting information about ongoing TNC forest management actions. Topics such as biochar, recreating responsibly, a design sprint assessment of 40,000 acres nearly Seeley Lake, a 2021 update on TNC goals for forest land transfers, a report on local land transactions in 2020, and land management partnerships to help restore camas to TNC forestlands.

Dave Hanna / TNC Photo Blackfoot / Clearwater