Somewhere in Montana, it will happen. Many places, actually — maybe in your town. And it’ll happen this summer. But nobody knows exactly when, where or how bad. Wildfire is an inherent part of life in the American West. In recent years, a warming climate has increasingly led to larger and more destructive wildfires becoming more common. But that’s an average trend over time. So, what about this fire season? Will blazing infernos turn Montana into ash? Or will the state escape widespread devastat...
Jun 01, 2023•25 min•Season 1Ep. 49
The Beartooth Pass climbs between Wyoming and Montana at an elevation close to 11,000 feet. The route through the Beartooth Mountains, Highway 212 between Cooke City and Red Lodge, contains the highest mountains in the state. Because of its elevation, the high landscape is a fragile tundra ecosystem where roads not driven in 50 years are still visible on the landscape. The highway opens on Friday morning, prior to the Memorial Day weekend. And because so much snow is piled atop the pass, skiers ...
May 25, 2023•20 min•Season 1Ep. 47
Brad Orsted wanted to get better. Facing the unimaginable loss of his infant daughter Marley while in his mother’s care, and the extreme guilt of unanswered questions surrounding her death, Orsted spent years meeting with doctors and therapists. They prescribed medications and therapy sessions as he self-medicated with alcohol, haunted by memories of Marley and spiraling downward into suicide scenarios. But what Orsted could not find in the bottom of a bottle of pills or vodka, he finally found ...
May 18, 2023•44 min•Season 1Ep. 48
As we plan and plant our gardens this spring, consider the mountain lion. The stealthy predators are strictly meat eaters, but what and where they kill provides nutrients for the soil and promotes plant growth. It’s an odd concept examined in a recent study by the big cat conservation group Panthera. From 2014 to 2018, the group collared 50 mountain lions and tracked them to identify kill sites. Once identified, the researchers collected soil and plant samples, comparing them from the kill site ...
May 11, 2023•19 min•Season 1Ep. 46
The 68th legislative session adjourned in a whirlwind Tuesday evening, with lawmakers making their final votes on spending and social bills. While unprecedented events over the last two week including protests and arrests grabbed national headlines, in other areas of the Capitol lawmakers debated some of the final bills dealing with hunting, fishing and access. Wildlife legislation often brings some of the biggest debates of the session, and while we did see plenty of strong opinions, this sessi...
May 04, 2023•26 min•Season 1Ep. 45
Bighorn sheep are an iconic species in Montana and the West. Rams, which can grow large curving horns, are prized by trophy hunters who will pay thousands of dollars at annual auctions to secure a permit to hunt. Yet the species has been plagued by small populations in many herds, die-offs due to disease and limited success when animals from healthy herds are transplanted to create new populations. Recently, Billings Gazette Outdoor editor Brett French wrote an article about Montana Fish, Wildli...
Apr 20, 2023•17 min•Season 1Ep. 45
The image went around the country in days: A man clinging to a broken chairlift 20 feet above the ground, one ski off, moments before he had no choice but to jump. What the image didn’t show was that moments before, the man’s 4-year-old son had fallen off the chair when it broke. It happened at Montana Snowbowl ski area just north of Missoula, back in March. The incident sparked an outcry from the community and prompted the U.S. Forest Service to investigate the safety and operations of Snowbowl...
Apr 13, 2023•24 min•Season 1Ep. 44
Freight train derailments in the U.S. have come under increasing scrutiny since a train carrying hazardous materials derailed and burned in East Palestine, Ohio, in early February. Montana is no stranger to freight train derailments. In 1996, a train derailed near Alberton and released chlorine. Some residents still live with health problems from chemical exposure. And, just this past Sunday, April 2, a freight train derailed near Paradise, spilling thousands of beers into the Clark Fork River. ...
Apr 06, 2023•38 min•Season 1Ep. 43
With large ear tufts and feet built for hunting snowshoe hares in deep powder, the Canada lynx is an elusive species prowling parts of Montana. Lynx range from Canada and Alaska south into a few states in the lower 48. While no large scale population estimates are available, scientists believe that northwest Montana and northern Idaho likely have the strongest populations, and that is important when considering factors that may put stress on the cats in the future. A recent study completed by Wa...
Mar 30, 2023•16 min•Season 1Ep. 42
Montana’s only wild horse herd is found in south-central Montana’s Pryor Mountains. This is an area of extremes. The lowlands are desert-like, while the mountain tops rise to more than 8,700 feet. Across about 42,000 acres of this rugged land a herd of about 205 are spread across lands managed mostly by the Bureau of Land Management, but also the Custer Gallatin National Forest and the National Park Service. The Pryor Mountain Wild Horse Range is one of only four designated wild horse and burro ...
Mar 23, 2023•22 min•Season 1Ep. 41
It’s a hallmark trait of bears, a characteristic known even by small children: bruins hibernate through winter. Except, this year around Missoula, many of them aren’t. From neighborhood “trash bears” to near-city grizzlies feeding on frozen roadkill all season — plus, rural grizzly tracks spotted amid a frigid and snowy February — bears in west-central Montana are active in greater number and frequency than normal for this time of year. On this episode is Joshua Murdock, the Missoulian’s outdoor...
Mar 16, 2023•33 min•Season 1Ep. 40
In 2022 a male wolf that was captured and fitted with a GPS collar south of Dillon decided to take a long hike through some of Montana’s most spectacular wild country. If the wolf had hitchhiked a ride in an automobile, the distance covered is close to 300 miles. But those miles don’t reflect the elevation gains and losses of climbing up and over the mountain ranges. They also don’t tally the rivers that course through the landscape, including the Madison, Gallatin, Yellowstone and Clarks Fork Y...
Mar 09, 2023•18 min•Season 1Ep. 39
The Blackfeet Nation, tucked along the north end of the Rocky Mountain Front, has played host to a tribally managed buffalo herd for decades. Now in the past, the tribe has sold occasional bison hunts to individuals, but last month marked the first time a tribe in Montanan opened a raffle bison hunt to the public. In partnership with Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks, the Blackfeet Nation invited members of the public to enter two trophy bison hunt raffles. People could buy 20 tickets maximum a...
Mar 02, 2023•28 min•Season 1Ep. 38
Christopher Preston went wandering with buffalo and running after barred owls in the dark to explore the fate of wild animals in a human world. In Tenacious Beasts , the University of Montana environmental philosophy professor examines what choices we make as we try to restore and rewild creatures that we’ve nearly wiped off the face of the planet. The effort took him many unexpected places, from Norwegian fjords full of humpback whales to Italian mountains with apple-munching grizzly bears and ...
Feb 23, 2023•43 min•Season 1Ep. 37
Montana has one of the most unique wildlife situations in the world. Yellowstone National Park bison almost annually migrate into Montana during the winter. Since the bison are carriers of the disease brucellosis, which can cause pregnant female cattle to abort, the park animals are not allowed to freely roam like other wildlife. Instead, they are confined to designated zones outside the park’s north and west entrances, near the communities of Gardiner and West Yellowstone. Incremental progress ...
Feb 16, 2023•22 min•Season 1Ep. 36
It’s the suit-and-tie version of a grizzly bear hunting season, with the federal government announcing it will consider petitions from Montana and Wyoming to remove the grizzly from Endangered Species Act protection and state legislators scrambling to make new laws and policies to exert local control of the big bears. But a lot of fine print stands between the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service review and a future grizzly trophy hunt. The apex predator has made big gains since the ESA gave it threat...
Feb 09, 2023•40 min•Season 1Ep. 35
For almost three-quarters of a century, the start of ski and snowboard season was marked by the Warren Miller Film Tour that fall. The narrated films, shown around the country and world, have documented the evolution of skiing and the rise of snowboarding across multiple generations. But for the first time, a new Warren Miller Film won’t actually be filmed this year. On this episode, Missoulian newspaper reporter Joshua Murdock, who writes about outdoor recreation and is himself an avid backcoun...
Feb 02, 2023•39 min•Season 1Ep. 34
It’s a fish of many names: burbot, ling, eel pout, lawyer, mud shark and poor man’s lobster, just to name a few. Montana’s major rivers and reservoirs are home to a fish that may not be the first to come to mind like trout or walleyes for anglers, but ling have a certain following when it comes to a unique fishing experience and great eating. Today I’m with Tom Kuglin with the Montana State News Bureau and we’re going to talk a bit about this species and a story we did taking to some dedicated l...
Jan 26, 2023•23 min•Season 1Ep. 33
Across the West, federal and state land management agencies are strategically logging, thinning and burning forests with the goal of making them more resilient to uncontrolled wildfire, as well as diseases. But conservationists and wildlife advocates worry the work will harm grizzly bears and other federally-protected species that call those habitats home. In Western Montana, three projects from different agencies have drawn criticism and lawsuits from stakeholders that say the work will damage ...
Jan 19, 2023•38 min•Season 1Ep. 32
In Montana’s backcountry, as well as along some well-traveled highways and railroads, avalanches are a cause for concern. Scientists have been working for decades to better understand these natural phenomena for a number of reasons – the biggest being to save lives. At the same time, national forests have created avalanche forecasting services to provide daily information to backcountry snowmobilers, snowshoers, skiers and snowboard about weather and avalanche conditions. Combined with newer cel...
Jan 12, 2023•17 min•Season 1Ep. 31
What does it take to become leader of the pack? For wolves in Yellowstone National Park, research shows it might be exposure to a cat-centric parasite. A recent study by University of Montana and Yellowstone biologists found a remarkable thing about toxoplasma gondii– a single-celled parasite that can survive in almost any warm-blooded animal but only reproduces in felines. It turns out that wolves infected with toxo, as the biologists nickname it, appears to turn wolves into risk-takers. That m...
Jan 05, 2023•27 min•Season 1Ep. 30
Tony Bynum operates at the intersection of conservation, wildlife, beauty and truth. The photographer and conservationist has stamped out a career capturing images of western big game, documented oil and gas development along the Rocky Mountain Front, wilderness values across Montana and a host of projects internationally. But while many find inspiration in beautiful landscapes and wildlife, few have seen them so up close and personal. Once a high ranking federal employee at the Environmental Pr...
Dec 29, 2022•1 hr 12 min•Season 1Ep. 29
Each fall as winter nears and cold temperatures descend on Hyalite Canyon near Bozeman, water that weeps from the cliff bands lining the canyon walls freezes into bulging layers of ice with translucent hues of white, yellow and blue. And each year, that frozen water allows human to defy the gravity that pulled the water out of the rock in the first place. If, of course, they're willing to climb it. Many are. And fear is sometimes the best motivator to keep climbing, but there are a lot of things...
Dec 22, 2022•43 min•Season 1Ep. 28
Glacier National Park’s namesake ice fields attract millions of visitors a year. Many wonder if they’re making a funeral visit. Predictions that all the glaciers in the park will melt by 2030 or sooner have been floating around for a couple decades. That deadline now looms less than a decade away. What would happen if Glacier Park’s glaciers disappeared? And what are some people thinking about as ways to save polar and glacial ice through the emerging field of geoengineering? On this episode, Ro...
Dec 15, 2022•37 min•Season 1Ep. 27
Thirty years ago a young German outdoorsman crossed the big ocean and landed in Montana. He quickly became fascinated with the freedom of opportunity to hunt and fish in the West. Since then he’s dedicated his career to answering why and how North American conservation works. Thomas Baumeister has dedicated his adult life to conservation both professionally and personally. Baumeister recently retired from Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks and now runs Access WILD, a llama outfitting business. He ...
Dec 08, 2022•1 hr 38 min•Season 1Ep. 26
The imperiled status of the river-dwelling population of Arctic grayling in Montana continues to roil the waters of public debate about the fate of the species’ survivors in the Big Hole River. The latest wrangle focuses on the utility or futility of stocking grayling in a Big Hole watershed creek and tributaries during a time of low flows and warm water. This fall, the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks released Arctic grayling fingerlings into a section of French Creek previously t...
Dec 01, 2022•14 min•Season 1Ep. 25
Montana’s wolf hunting season is in full swing with trapping season set to begin soon, but a recent state judge’s order has put a temporary halt to some regulations and an upcoming hearing could have major implications on the remainder of the season. Republicans in the 2021 the Montana Legislature passed a number of laws aimed at reducing Montana’s wolf population, which pushed the Montana Fish and Wildlife Commission to adopt some of the most aggressive regulations since delisting. Contentious ...
Nov 24, 2022•50 min•Season 1Ep. 24
The Badger-Two Medicine region nestles between the Blackfeet Indian Reservation, Glacier National Park and the Helena-Lewis and Clark National Forest. It also lies in legal limbo after the latest court decision re-opened a fight over energy drilling rights that’s been going on for three decades. On September 9, U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ordered the Department of Interior to re-instate a federal lease and drilling permit to Solenex LLC. That lease covers about 10 square miles of the Badger...
Nov 17, 2022•46 min•Season 1Ep. 23
Part teacher and part guide, Whitney Gould is one of the finest casters in the world and fresh off competing in the World Fly Casting Championships in Norway where she took home a trove of medals, including a gold. Her first world championships was both exciting, she said, and a learning experience for what to expect and how to train for the next championships in two years. Gould is a spey specialist, referring to the two-handed casting technique common in big salmon and steelhead rivers, but wi...
Nov 10, 2022•34 min•Season 1Ep. 22
GPS collars attached to wildlife like deer, bears, moose, elk and pronghorns have opened biologist’s eyes to how far these species may move across the landscape as the seasons change. Epic feats of travel have been recorded in Wyoming showing elk swimming streams in spring runoff to reach ideal grazing areas. A mule deer doe has trekked 500 miles each year from the Red Desert of southwestern Wyoming to Grand Teton National Park. Pronghorns, although prairie animals, have been photographed moving...
Nov 03, 2022•21 min•Season 1Ep. 21
