Reshaping the Crown

From downtown Lincoln you can now head for miles in any direction and still say you're within the Crown of the Continent, thanks to the work done by University of Montana Geography Professor Rick Graetz and his former graduate student Katie Shank.

Last Friday, Graetz and Shank unveiled a new southern boundary for the Crown, which highlights the region around Lincoln and adds about 275,000 acres and 87 miles of the Continental Divide to the 13-million-acre ecosystem.

Over the years, the boundaries of the Crown have been somewhat nebulous. Some maps show its boundaries in Montana extending west of Eureka, east nearly to Conrad and south of Lincoln to Nevada Mountain. In terms of a provably connected ecosystem, however, the southern boundary had generally been drawn at Roger's Pass and Highway 200, putting Lincoln right on its border. Now, thanks to the work done by Shank over a two-and-a-half-year period, the region south of Lincoln has been proven to be part of the largest intact th America. Shank spent the summer of 2016 along the Continental Divide Trail, assessing the biodiversity of the flora between Rogers Pass and Black Mountain. Every two miles she conducted a survey of the plant life within a five-meter by five-meter area on either side of the trail. She found the area had high biodiversity, comparable to areas she had looked at within the Scapegoat Wilderness.

Diversity of plants also tends to mean diversity of wildlife, and in her evaluation of wildlife migration in the area, Shank found that large animals regularly move south out of the Bob Marshal Wilderness complex and into the area.

"There's quite a diverse range of mammals in the Helena National Forest that shows they're obviously able to cross Highway 200 safely," Shank said.

Grizzlies were one of the species that helped prove the connectedness of the ecosystem.

"In the past five years, there have been more observations of grizzlies coming down into the region, which indicates that they are migrating south out of the mountains during the summer months," Graetz said.

Graetz and Shank presente her research at the Lincoln Community Hall in December of 2017,

but it took Graetz a year and a half to sort out the ecosystem boundary on the ground.

"It's a very diverse region and I think one of the special things about the Crown of the Continent ecosystem in general...the boundaries aren't an exact thing," Shank Said. "It's an ecosystem. But what makes it exciting is that we have the capability of drawing these lines around another portion of the region that we think is good enough to be part of that ecosystem."

For Graetz, the east and west boundaries were obvious: Highway 141 from Highway 200 to Avon and MacDonald Pass in the west, and Highway 434 from Highway 200 to Wolf Creek in the east. It was the southern frontier that proved problematic. Working with Dave Nardinger of Helena, he explored the area north and east of MacDonald Pass and ultimately concluded that the region east of the Divide and South of Marysville and Canyon Creek had to be excluded due to human presence limiting wildlife migration.

"It's not just the biological diversity, it's not the flora, fauna, landscape, the climate working together, the key point to me is wildlife connectivity," Graetz said. "Where wildlife can no longer roam..."

IN addition to the overarching ecosystem, the boundary extension also plays a role in Graetz's desire to help Lincoln prosper.

Graetz has long pushed for Lincoln to promote its connection to the Crown of the Continent. In 2014, he presented a slideshow highlighting the area around Lincoln and some things people may take for granted or simply not know about. He also suggested at the time that the community promote itself as the "Base Camp for the Southwestern Crown of the Continent."

That inspired the creation of an informal Base Camp Group to explore opportunities for Lincoln. That group in turn contributed to the efforts behind the Envision Lincoln economic development proposals and to the Upper Blackfoot Working Group, which recently unveiled a land management proposal for the Lincoln area inspired in part by the Rocky Mountain Front Heritage Act.

Now that the community can say it's fully a part of the largest connected natural ecosystem in North America, Graetz sees it as a chance to really set itself apart.

"I think Lincoln is one of the key crown of the continent communities, in my opinion," Graetz said. "And its near population centers. My own feeling, due to our economic vitality efforts, we look at this is an economic benefit to the town. They can say "We're surrounded by the Crown"

Karyn Good, who has been instrumental in organizing or coordinating community efforts associated or stemming from the Base Camp Group, agrees that being a part of the Crown is a terrific opportunity in line with the towns other promotional efforts, such as its designation as the Montana's first CDT Gateway Community.

"When I think of the Crown of the Continent, I associate it with beauty. I think others do as well. When they hear Lincoln is a part of that, they're going to think 'what a beautiful place,'" she said.

Becky Garland, a business owner and lifelong resident of Lincoln, said she's thrilled to celebrate what the area has to offer and sees inclusion in the Crown as one more thing that makes the town unique.

"I'm tickled with it. I was tickled to be the Base Camp of the Crown of the Continent, so now being right in the middle of it, surrounded by it, I think is really wonderful," she said.

However, given local concerns about recreation and public land access, Garland also sounded a note of caution about possible misperceptions. She said people need to know it won't affect access to trails or roads or public lands around the valley.

"There's a lot of education to be done with folks...to understand that the Crown of the Continent is not closing our doors to people," she said. "We're proud of the designation and we're proud of being in the center of it, but this is not telling people where they can and can't go to recreate. I think that's very important to remember."

"It's also a really interesting opportunity to share the story that a community in the center of an ecological jewel is possible, and that the vitality of that community is connected to how healthy those lands are," Jordan Reeves with the Wilderness Society said. "You can have a combination of working landscapes, working ranches, forest restoration and timber thinning project happening at the same time you have folks riding the trails and hiking trails. You also have protected habitat through wilderness and through other means. It takes that whole picture and all those different types of uses to create a successful... harmonious situation between community and environment."