• Home
  • How We Work
  • Where We Work
  • News Room
  • About Us
  • My Nature Page

The Nature Conservancy in Africa - Conservation in Africa

The Nature Conservancy in Asia Pacific - Conservation in Asia-Pacific

The Nature Conservancy in the Caribbean - Conservation in the Caribbean

The Nature Conservancy in Central America - Conservation in Central America

The Nature Conservancy in North America - Conservation in North America

The Nature Conservancy in the United States - Conservation in the United States

The Nature Conservancy in South America - Conservation in South America

Crown of the Continent

the North Fork of the Flathead
The North Fork, west of Glacier
© Rick & Susie Graetz

Why the Conservancy Selected This Site
This 10-million-acre international ecosystem includes the Bob Marshall-Great Bear-Scapegoat Wilderness Complex, Canada's Castle Wilderness, the Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park, large blocks of unprotected public lands and critically important private lands. Home to some of the most intact wildland on the continent, this region contains almost all of the wild creatures that the native peoples, including the Blackfeet Indians, encountered on their forays into the Backbone of the World. (For stunning photos and narrative about the Crown, see "Crown of the Continent" by Ralph Waldt.)

Threats
In recent years, this ecosystem has been under increasing threat from subdivisions and housing development, especially in the river valleys connecting the higher elevation lands. Rising land prices in this scenic area threatens ranching and the wildlife habitat it supports. 

Animals
This region is home to many species that are threatened elsewhere, including grizzly bears, lynx, fisher, gray wolves and bull trout.

Our Conservation Strategy
The Conservancy's involvement ensuring the long-term ecological health of this region includes habitat preservation, ecological restoration and community based conservation.  Elements of our strategy include:

  • Developing community-based partnerships to respond to intensifying development pressures
  • Providing landowners with stewardship and conservation tools, including conservation agreements.
  • Landscape-scale protection that honors the needs of communities, ranchers, families and native peoples.

What the Conservancy Has Done/Is Doing
Guided by ecoregional planning and sound science, Conservancy staff and our partners have identified key areas and strategies to protect species, habitqat and natural communities targeted for conservation. Private, low-elevation lands in valleys and around rivers are some of the most threatened with development in this scenic region. These are precisely the areas needed by wide-ranging wildlife. The Conservancy is working with private landowners and its partners to conserve these low-elevation lands that link to the high country. We're using conservation easements and building stewardship partnerships across the region. 

Along the Rocky Mountain Front, low-elevation ranchlands connect the praries to the mountains are critical, so we're working with ranchers whose stewardship has been compatible with wildlife. So far almost 47,000 acres along the Front are in Conservancy conservation ownership or conservation easement.

In the Blackfoot Watershed, on the Crown's southern border, conservation efforts over the last 30 years have made substantial improvements, including wetlands restoration, wildlife habitat improvements, weed control, runoff control and conservation protection against improper development. Now the valley residents, led by the Blackfoot Challenge, are embarking on their largest project to date, the Blackfoot Community Project, whose goal is to secure the valley's rural heritage for the future. As part of the community-supported project, the Conservancy has purchased 43,000 acres from a timber company and is re-selling it according to a community based plan, to public buyers and private buyers, with conservation agreements.