Nick Mott

The last two years have been the deadliest on record for grizzlies in and around Glacier National Park. There have been at least 48 grizzly mortalities this year in the area, called the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem (NCDE). As grizzly mortalities mount, bear managers in northwest Montana are trying to tackle the sources of rising deaths.

Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks announced Tuesday that it’s crafting a new statewide management plan for grizzly bears.

Two top officials in the Trump Administration offered support for one of the state’s final remaining tribal water agreements last week.

The Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes Water Compact narrowly passed the state Legislature in 2015 after more than a decade of negotiation. It settles water rights in and around the Flathead Reservation. Now, it needs to pass in the U.S. Congress.

Two stone fly species found in Glacier National Park were listed as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act Wednesday due to the impacts of climate change, according to a rule published by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The two species, the western glacier stone fly and the meltwater lednian stone fly, depend on glacial meltwater in high-elevation alpine environments. But scientists estimate the famed ice masses and snowfields of Glacier National Park will have mostly disappeared by 2030.

The state of Montana filed its final arguments late last week in the complex and controversial lawsuit over the fate of Yellowstone-area grizzly bears.

In the summer of 2017 the Department of the Interior removed Endangered Species Act protections for the roughly 700 bears estimated to live in the area at the time. Tribes and conservation groups promptly filed suit and a federal judge in Missoula restored protections for the bruins last fall

While federal debate rages over the future of the Endangered Species Act, Montana’s representative in the U.S. House says the Trump administration's rollbacks last month don’t go far enough.

Republican Greg Gianforte introduced a bill making it easier to delist species protected by the ESA at a Congressional Western Caucus roundtable in Washington D.C. Tuesday.

The Trump administration Wednesday reversed course on its May announcement that it would close or privatize a lot of Job Corps centers across the country, including two in Montana. The program focuses on trade skills, wildfire response and education. Nick Mott reports from the Trapper Creek Job Corps in Darby.