Photo by Lisa Hupp/USFWS
Yesterday, April 3, 2025, the Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Council on Wildlife and Fish and Native Ecosystems Council filed a federal lawsuit to protect habitat for three rare wildlife species — grizzly bears, lynx, and sage grouse — in Gravelly Mountains of Montana, which is an area that provides a critical wildlife corridor connecting the Yellowstone area to other mountain ranges in Montana. The challenged government action is called the “Greenhorn” project and it allows destructive logging, road-building, and burning activities across thousands of acres of public lands in this key wildlife corridor zone in the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest..
We are deeply disappointed that the government would authorize this destructive project on our public lands considering the number of court rulings that have found similar projects illegal because such projects violate a number of federal laws designed to protect rare wildlife species.
The project area is enormous. It’s located about 10 miles south of Virginia City, Montana and calls for bulldozing in 28.7 miles of new and rebuilt logging roads to enable logging and burning over 17,000 acres or 26.5 square miles in prime wildlife habitat, much of it in inventoried roadless areas.
The government illegally eliminated 1.1 million acres of lynx habitat protections on the Beaverhead -Deerlodge National Forest in 2020, and it relies on that illegal removal to authorize logging in lynx habitat here. Multiple federal courts have found this to be illegal, and the government knows it.
Sage grouse populations are also in very steep decline and the federal government is desperately trying to keep from having them listed under the Endangered Species Act. Consequently, destroying their habitat with clearcutting, burning, and bulldozing simply makes no sense. Nonetheless, the government never applied their own mandatory sage grouse protections to this project.
Photo by Richard Prodgers
Also, the Beaverhead-Deerlodge Forest Plan requires that 60% of the Gravellies be managed for secure grizzly habitat. Currently only 54% of the Gravellies provide secure habitat for grizzlies; the Greenhorn project would reduce grizzly secure habitat by one third. At the same time the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks is trucking grizzly bears from the Glacier ecosystem to the Yellowstone ecosystem for genetic connectivity, — why not just follow the law, protect the grizzly corridor, and let grizzlies walk there on their own? This government action just makes no sense.
Photo by Glenn Phillips
This is an important corridor where grizzlies from Yellowstone could travel to breed with grizzlies from other isolated grizzly populations, and do it without trucks and for free.
What happens when the executive branch of the federal government breaks the law? The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution not only guarantees freedom of speech, it also gives citizens the right to sue the federal government for very good reasons. If someone throws a brick through a window, the police enforce the law. But when a federal executive agency breaks the law, the citizens must stand up to enforce the law. This is how the civil justice system works and citizens should never be shamed or intimidated from using the civil justice system to hold the government accountable to the law.
We are not afraid to take federal agencies to court to make them follow the law because the Constitution is on our side. Our government does not exist to serve the for-profit interests of the billionaires. Our government exists to protect our land, water, air, and wildlife for current and future generations. Public lands are for the public — not private profit — and we will continue to stand up for this principle despite the name-calling and threats we are always subjected to by politicians and special interests. This is our home and we will protect it. Their money and scare tactics will not stop us.
If you agree, please consider helping us fight to protect habitat for native species and make the federal government follow the law.
Mike Garrity is the Executive Director of the Alliance for the Wild Rockies.
