Keeping Connected to Wildlife and Wildlands

Celebrating 30 Years of Wild Thinking

July 14 -19, 2008

~ All events to be held in Bozeman and surrounding area, and are open to the public ~

This year, American Wildlands is celebrating thirty years of conservation programs and accomplishments. While our strategic forte had changed a few times in those three decades, the primary focus of the organization has remained the same—to use science, respectful advocacy, community engagement and the most cutting edge conservation tools as the foundation of efforts to protect the vast wild lands, healthy wild waters, and abundant wildlife of the West. American Wildlands’ work has evolved over the years through three eras:

1) our founding directors initially helped blaze the trail for the new wilderness movement;

2) our “forest watch” days when we trained to more than 1,400 citizens on how to engage in local forest management planning and monitoring on the roadless areas of our public lands;

3) our present day focus on using the best science and computer GIS technology to identify and conserve critical wildlife movement corridors for the entire U.S. Northern Rockies region.

Today, American Wildlands is best known as the “corridors group”, an appropriate brand reflected in our mission statement: Keeping the world-renowned U.S. Northern Rockies ecologically intact by restoring and maintaining connections between key habitats for healthy populations of native wildlife.

Please join American Wildlands for a week of public events as we celebrate 30 years of conservation successes, and map out our future connections to such issues as forest and energy development on public lands, private land subdivision, co-existing with wildlife, and climate change.

Weekday Evening Presentations: Free Admission

Monday, July 14:

Presentation on the natural history of lynx and wolverine, specifically their wide-ranging travels, and how that ties into the need to maintain habitat connectivity and wildlife movement corridors. Speakers to be determined.

Tuesday, July 15:

Presentation on the natural history of grizzly bears and pronghorn antelope, specifically their wideranging travels. Dr. Lance Craighead (grizzly bears) and TBD (antelope).

Wednesday, July 16:

Presentation and panel discussion about the link between economy and ecology, and the growing movement in the for-profit community to support/sponsor conservation efforts. This presentation will be geared toward business owners, but is open to anyone. Speakers: Ray Rasker (Headwaters Economics) and local business owners.

Thursday, July 17:

Presentation about the state of wilderness as a designated protected area, a concept, a human need,a community benefit and an ecological value. Speaker: Roderick Nash, renowned environmental historian and author of Wilderness and the American Mind.

The Main Event: Friday, July 18

A day-long symposium that looks at the increasingly visionary and coordinated global effort to address the threats to, and opportunities for, maintaining habitat connectivity and wildlife movement corridors, including the collaborative efforts of American Wildlands and others here in the U.S. Northern Rockies.

With a lunch and dinner keynote presentation, cocktail hour, and four afternoon “case studies” of exciting habitat connectivity/wildlife movement projects from around the world, the symposium is part modern interpretation of “a conference at which several speakers discuss a topic before an audience,” and part ancient Greek interpretation of “a convivial meeting, usually following a dinner, for intellectual conversation.”

Opening Keynote (lunch):

Harvey Locke will set the stage about how the work of American Wildlands and others in the Northern Rockies fits in a global effort to conserve habitat connectivity and wildlife movement corridors. Harvey is co-founder of the Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative, has served on the board of numerous conservation NGOs, and was named one of Canada’s leaders for the 21st century by Time Canada magazine.

Four “case study” presentations on connectivity projects around the world:

~ Iain Douglas-Hamilton, founder of Save the Elephants, will discuss his efforts to track elephant movements in order to identify safe havens and the connecting wildlife movement corridors for these large animals in the changing landscape of Kenya.
~ Jon Miceler, Managing Director for World Wildlife Fund’s Eastern Himalayas program, will discuss the Sacred Himalayan Landscape Initiative. This project is focused on creating an unbroken green corridor linking the forest, grassland and montane ecosystems of Nepal, India and Bhutan with those of Myanmar and China (Tibet) on behalf of the tiger, rhino, Asian elephant and snow leopard.
~ Miguel Rafa, with the Fundació Territori i Paisatge in Spain, will discuss efforts to rebuild the ecological linkages between four of the main Western European mountain ranges: the Cantabrian Mountains, the Pyrenees, the Massif Central and the Alps—known as the Great Mountain Corridor.
~ Graeme Worboys, a 30 year veteran of the Australian National Parks, will discuss the new “Alps to Atherton” wildlife corridor spanning the entirety of eastern Australia, which will allow plants and animals to move into new habitats as the continent’s climate changes.

Evening Keynote:

After a sit-down dinner, Rick Ridgeway, mountaineer, adventurer, author of the highly acclaimed Seven Summits, The Shadow of Kilimanjaro and, most recently, Below Another Sky, and current head of Patagonia’s Environmental Program, will introduce Patagonia’s newly launched “Freedom to Roam” campaign for North America.

COST: The lunch keynote and afternoon presentations is $30 per person; the dinner and evening keynote presentation is $30 per person; or the full day is $50 per person.

Field Trips to American Wildlands’ Conservation Project Areas: Saturday, July 19

Two early afternoon field trips to see and discuss American Wildlands’ on-the-ground conservation projects, one will focus on our Corridors of Life program and the other on our Safe Passages program. Space is limited.

Bozeman Pass (Safe Passages): Leave Bozeman at noon for a short drive to Bozeman Pass, back in Bozeman by no later than 2:00.

Madison Valley (Corridors of Life):Leave Bozeman at noon for a drive to Madison Valley and the town of Ennis, onto Virginia City, then circumnavigating the Tobacco Root Mountains and back to Bozeman by 4:30.