Maps: West-Central Region

The wild country of Montana’s West-Central Region has become even more vital for wildlife and people as the area’s valleys rapidly fill up with subdivisions, roads and traffic. The transformation of quiet rural landscapes is most evident in the Missoula and Bitterroot valleys, placing new urban pressures on the two surrounding National Forests, the Lolo and Bitterroot. Both forests are revising their Forest Plans, which will guide management of these public lands for the next 15 to 20 years. Montana Wilderness Association is working to assure that the final plans protect the wild, primitive character and traditional uses of these forests.

The 2-million acre Lolo National Forest surrounds Missoula, a city of 60,000. The Lolo Forest is influenced by both continental and maritime climates, producing diverse ecosystems ranging from wet, western red cedar bottomlands to high alpine peaks to forests of alpine larch and whitebark pine.

The 1.6-million acre Bitterroot National Forest, located in southwest Montana and spanning into Idaho, encompasses some of the most rugged, remote terrain in the Rockies, including the 1.3-million acre Selway Bitterroot Wilderness—the third largest Wilderness area in the lower 48 states. With nearly half the forest dedicated to the largest expanse of continuous, pristine wilderness between the two coasts, this country is more the domain of deer, elk, moose, black bear, and bighorn sheep than of humans. The Bitterroot Forest’s beauty is especially on display in the heavily glaciated, rugged peaks of the Bitterroot Range. Drainages carved by glaciers form steep canyons that open onto the valley floor, while towering cliffs rise up above tumbling mountain streams. National Forest land begins where the foothills give way to mountains—the Bitterroot Mountains on the west and the Sapphire Mountains on the east—on either side of the Bitterroot River Valley.

Highlights of the two National Forests

• The proposed Great Burn Wilderness, a 300,000-acre “gem of wild beauty” on the Montana/Idaho border, so-named because it still bears the striking visual and ecological remnants of the conflagration of 1910, the greatest wildfire in recorded American history.
• Lolo Peak, a beloved icon and lofty landmark for the Missoula and Bitterroot valleys, stands at the northern boundary of the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness, and is a prime destination for quiet recreation and an enduring source of inspiration. This primitive area is home to a wonderful variety of wildlife species including elk, deer, moose, eagles and wolves. Still wild and regal over the valleys below, Lolo Peak appears to us today much as it did to Lewis and Clark 200 years ago.
• The Quigg and Stoney Recommended Wilderness areas form the headwaters of Rock Creek, a blue-ribbon wild trout stream just 30 miles east of Missoula.
• The Welcome Creek Wilderness lies at the mouth of the Rock Creek drainage. This 28,135-acre wildland is criss-crossed with steep ridges and narrow valleys. A rough, rocky, but rewarding landscape, most of Welcome Creek is heavily timbered with pine, fir and larch.
• The southern boundary of the Rattlesnake National Recreation Area and Wilderness is just four miles north of Missoula. Deer, elk, coyotes, mountain goats, bighorn sheep, black bears, moose, and mountain lions reside in the Rattlesnake. With the Wilderness boundary so close to the city limits, the Rattlesnake can truly be called Missoula’s backyard Wilderness playground.

You can get involved in this region by contacting the Wild Divide Chapter, MWA’s Conservation Director, or joining us on a Wilderness Walk.

The Anaconda-Pintler Wilderness, Bob Marshall Wilderness, Mission Mountains Wilderness, Rattlesnake Wilderness, Scapegoat Wilderness, Selway Bitterroot Wilderness, Welcome Creek Wilderness, Blue Joint Wilderness Study Area, Sapphires Wilderness Study Area, Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest, Bitterroot National Forest and Lolo National Forest are found in this region. For more information check Wilderness Areas, Wilderness Study Areas and National Forests.

More information about the Beaverhead-Deerlodge Partnership and Blackfoot Clearwater Landscape Stewardship Project can be found at Campaigns.