Montana Backcountry Alliance is a citizen group. We are volunteers, working to protect our favorite places to ride, hike, and tour. Simply being out, safely skiing, showshoeing, and riding is truly the best way to help. Also engage local land managers whenever possible and speak about your use and preference for the land. If you’d like to take a more active role Check out some of the links below to protect the peace, solitude, and beauty you love about Montana in winter:
The Backcountry Scientist Project
The Backcountry Scientist Project is an innovative program that trains and engages backcountry skiers, Nordic Skiers and snowshoers as volunteer citizen scientists and activists in the conservation of rare carnivores. Developed and coordinated by Winter Wildlands Alliance, volunteers are be educated in rare carnivore ecology, conservation, and research. As backcountry scientists, skiers and snowshoers will learn how to recognize, document and report rare carnivore tracks. This information will be compiled and made available to wildlife biologists, wildlife agencies, and land managers with the end result of better and more site-specific winter travel planning and wildlife conservation.
To learn more about rare carnivores or to report tracks or a sighting of a lynx, fisher, or wolverine please contact Wild Things Unlimited at:
http://home.mcn.net/~wtu/about_rare.html
Whitebark Pine Field Workshops
Montana Backcountry Alliance has teamed up with the Natural Resource Defense Council and Cooke City Ski Club to offer citizen scientist monitoring of whitebark pine mortality in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Ski tour with veteran forest entomologist and underground ski legend, Jesse Logan, to learn more about this species and the threats it faces. The workshops are free and open to all those with intermediate ski touring ability. Please email Whitney Leonard (wleonard@nrdc.org) if you are interested in attending one of these workshops.
Send a Backcountry Experience Report
It is crucial that land managers hear about their backcountry experiences on public lands. This information helps us work with land managers to determine the appropriate recreation management action for particular lands. Please tell us about your experience. Include both positive and negative experiences, such as: incidents of conflict or cooperation between different backcountry user groups, violations of and/or compliance with use designations, safety concerns, environmental and wildlife observations.
Report a negative backcounty experience
