Range Riders

The Range Riders Project is a collaborative, community-based project to reduce and prevent conflicts between wolves and livestock in the Northern Rockies. Beginning in 2004, Predator Conservation Alliance found private funding to hire riders on horseback to patrol public lands and prevent conflicts between wolves and livestock. The idea originated from local ranchers in the Madison Valley, and PCA formalized a partnership with them, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks, the U.S. Forest Service, and the Turner Endangered Species Fund in 2004 to implement and oversee the project during its first and successive field seasons.

The riders spend June through October camped on the Beaverhead Deerlodge National Forest and use their presence and non-lethal methods to prevent conflicts between wolves and livestock. The original goals of the project were to: 1.) Prevent and reduce wolf and livestock losses in Montana’s Madison Valley; 2.) Rebuild broken trust between conservationists, landowners, and wildlife managers in the region; 3.) Create a model that communities in the Northern Rockies and elsewhere could replicate and learn from; and 4.) Develop a plan for the community and landowners to financially sustain the project over time.

Now planning its third field season in the Madison Valley, the Range Riders Project has succeeded in meeting many of its original goals and objectives, including reducing conflicts between wolves and livestock. In addition, news of the project’s success has spread to other valleys in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, and PCA was asked in early 2005 by ranchers in Montana’s Boulder River Valley to provide the seed money and leadership to help replicate the Range Riders Project there. We will continue projects in both areas in 2006.

Gravelly Range Grizzly Bear Project and Blackfoot River Challenge

In critical areas like the Madison-Gravelly Mountains, and Montana’s Blackfoot Valley, two new program associates for Predator Conservation Alliance are working to reduce conflicts between humans and grizzly bears.

Steve Primm is working in the Madison-Gravelly Mountains complex, and Dr. Seth Wilson is working in the Blackfoot Valley. Both areas are key unprotected areas for grizzlies and could help island populations of grizzly bears in the Northern Rockies to reconnect.

In the past five years, more and more grizzly bears have been spotted using private agricultural lands in the Madison-Gravelly and Blackfoot areas. These areas may be serving as potential linkage habitat for bears that could be trying to disperse to new areas. While this activity is good from a “connectivity” perspective, conflicts and grizzly-management removals have also increased as a result. A first step for improving the prospects for connected bear populations is to develop practical examples of how people and bears can coexist.

Grizzlies are extremely curious and persistent in searching for food. These traits sometimes lead them into people’s backcountry camps, near homes, or to developed areas, where they may find unnatural foods such as garbage and pet food. Then they tend to lose their wariness of people and unfortunately are often relocated or killed by managers as a result of concern for human safety.

Steve and Seth are leading PCA’s efforts to reduce the availability of human-based food sources and “attractants” for bears — and thus the potential for conflicts — on private lands in these two key areas.

Steve, who has a master’s in environmental policy from the University of Colorado, has worked since 1992 on large-carnivore conservation projects. He has been working in the Madison-Gravelly complex since 1996.

Seth is a postdoctoral researcher at the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. He holds a Ph.D. from the College of Forestry and Conservation and an M.S. from the Environmental Studies Program at the University of Montana. He has been working on grizzly bear research and applied conservation since 1996.

Predator Friendly

Predator Friendly products come from animals raised by ranchers and farmers who do not kill native predators on their land – coyotes, foxes, mountain lions, bears, hawks, eagles, or wolves.

Predator Friendly growers reduce the risks of livestock losses by using guard animals such as llamas,dogs,and burros,and by using pasture management strategies to minimize confrontations between their animals and predators.

In 1991, a group of ranchers, conservationists, and clothing manufacturers began to certify woolgrowers who agreed in writing to a strict set of criteria to qualify for Predator Friendly status. In 2003 they turned over the certification task to Predator Conservation Alliance.

More and more growers are choosing positive, sustainable alternatives to shooting, trapping, and poisoning native predators. By choosing to become Predator Friendly certified you are sharing the rewards and risks of sustainable agriculture in America. Click here to download a free brochure! (0.6 MB .pdf file)