Bitterroot National Forest Hits Brakes on Thinning and Prescribed Burning Project
The decision follows pushback from conservationists about impacts to grizzlies, bull trout and wolverines
By Amanda Eggert for Montana Free Press
The Bitterroot National Forest is hitting the brakes on a 4-year-old proposal to use thinning and prescribed burning to remove vegetation across a vast swath of the Bitterroot Valley following pushback about impacts to threatened and endangered species.
Citing its commitment to gather more information about the proposal’s impact on grizzly bears, wolverines and bull trout — all of which are federally protected under the Endangered Species Act — the U.S. Forest Service sent a letter to project opponents on Friday saying it won’t move forward with the Eastside Forest and Habitat Improvement Project until consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is complete.
In 2021, the Bitterroot National Forest pitched the project as an effort to mitigate wildfire risk, promote forest restoration and improve wildlife habitat for elk and other species. The area identified for thinning and prescribed burning stretches along the eastern edge of the Bitterroot Valley from Stevensville to Sula.
Friends of the Bitterroot, WildEarth Guardians, Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Native Ecosystems Council, and the Center for Biological Diversity took issue with the project’s anticipated impact on wildlife habitat and lack of detail about the “precise location, timing and scope of the treatments.”
Without such information, USFS and USFWS are “unable to adequately assess the Projects’ effects to bull trout, bull trout critical habitat, grizzly bears, wolverine and Canada lynx in violation of the ESA,” the groups wrote in a notice of intent to sue submitted to the Forest Service on January 7.
The Bitterroot National Forest used a 30-page categorical exclusion to forward the proposal, relying on a process that offers less analysis and fewer opportunities for public comment than other environmental reviews.
In that document, the Forest Service highlighted the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes’ historical use of fire to improve wildlife habitat and grazing for horses, rejuvenate native plants and clear travel corridors. The forest developed non-lethal fire regimes and fire-adapted vegetation as a result of those intentionally set fires, the agency wrote, adding that a century of fire exclusion has created thicker forest cover “favorable for insects, disease and stand-replacing wildfire.”
According to its March 7 letter to the environmental groups, the Forest Service now considers the threatened lawsuit moot given the agency’s commitment to study the plan’s effects on threatened and endangered species before moving forward.
In a press release about the Forest Service’s commitment to postpone the project, the conservation groups highlighted the area’s biological diversity and the Bitterroot Range’s value to hunters, hikers and other recreationists.
“The Forest Service approved a project that spans nearly a half-million acres without taking a hard look at how road use was going to harm grizzly bears in the Sapphire Mountains and returning to the Bitterroot ecosystem,” WildEarth Guardians rewilding manager Adam Rissien wrote in the release, referring to the outer boundary of the area that could be treated over the project’s life. “Approved under what is called a ‘categorical exclusion,’ the agency was clearly pushing beyond the bounds of its authority, and we’re pleased it’s reversing course to comply with the law.”
The Bitterroot National Forest has not responded to questions from Montana Free Press regarding its decision.
The Ravalli County Commission penned a letter in 2023 encouraging the Forest Service to move forward with the Bitterroot Front project, a sister proposal slated for the western edge of the Bitterroot Valley. Unlike the East Side project, the Bitterroot Front project involves commercial timber harvest.
An email to Ravalli County Commissioner Jeff Burrows seeking comment on the Forest Service’s decision to reconsider the East Side project was not returned before publication.
The Bitterroot National Forest has a long history of fighting wildfires in southwestern Montana’s increasingly populated wildland-urban interface. The current conflict over vegetation management and wildfire risk in the valley comes nine years after the Roaring Lion Fire consumed 16 structures near Hamilton and eight years after a 29-year-old firefighter died while responding to the Lolo Peak Fire.
The proposal’s reconsideration also comes as the Trump administration pursues dramatic revisions to the National Environmental Policy Act, the decades-old law directing federal agencies to study and disclose environmental impacts associated with timber sales and other large projects. In a similar vein, the White House on March 1 issued an executive order broadening the federal government’s authority to skip Endangered Species Act consultations for logging projects.