Nick Mott

An oil company comes in, drills a hole and a well is born. But what if the well stops producing or the company in charge goes bankrupt, leaving behind holes that can be thousands of feet deep, spout toxic gasses and muck things up on the surface? These so-called 'orphan wells' are all over Montana.

A caterpillar crosses the road. It starts a conversation about the long view of conservation, across species and across generations.

A scientist realizes if sea ice keeps melting, polar bears will go extinct. To help them, the Endangered Species Act takes on climate change — and in this battle, the law may have met its match.

A fish killing mystery that starts with the Endangered Species Act shows how state and federal wildlife law went from a weapon used against tribes, to a tool for tribes to reclaim what was stripped away.

From grizzlies to wolves, hunting plays a controversial role in many Endangered Species Act stories. This time, an African animal on Texas ranchland shows how hunting does — and doesn’t — serve conservation.

Wolves get trapped in the wild, loaded onto an airplane, and delivered to Montana and Idaho. When they scamper off into the wilderness, they test a question central to endangered species debates: What does it mean to recover a species?

A gang of monkey-wrenching activists try a new approach in the fight to save threatened species and ecosystems: They put on suits and enter the courtroom. In doing so, they change conservation forever.

The first great battle over the Endangered Species Act begins. Thanks to an eclectic group of activists, a tiny fish in Tennessee halts construction on a massive dam and ends up in front of the Supreme Court.

The Endangered Species Act helped bring the Yellowstone-area grizzly population back from the brink of extinction. It also sparked controversy over a question that looms over more species than just grizzly bears: How do we balance the needs of endangered wildlife with the needs of humans?

A Helena listener had a long-simmering curiosity about a relic of Montana history that still sits just across the Beaverhead River from Twin Bridges: The old Montana State Orphanage built in 1894. We took a look around with one of the previous residents. Join us for the tour. This episode was first released September 27, 2023.