The Hub Conservation Area - Montanans 4 Safe Wildlife Passage

Beaverhead Mountains to the south, and theBitterroot Range to the north. West of theSapphire Mountains lies the Bitterroot Valley.The Bitterroot River runs through the centerof this valley. The city of Missoula is at thevery northern end of the Bitterroot Valley. Atthe western edge of the Hub are the ruggedBitterroot Mountains.Regional Wildlife MovementGrizzly bears, black bears, lynx, wolverine,wolves, mountain lions, elk, moose, pronghorn,bighorn sheep, and mountain goats can all befound in the Hub region.Grizzly bear populations are thriving andexpanding in the Cabinet-Yaak and Crown ofthe Continent (Northern Continental DivideEcosystem) to the north of the Hub. As a result,the biologists interviewed for this assessmentgenerally described a southbound movementfrom these “core” areas into the Hub. There aregreater numbers of verified grizzly activity fromthe Continental Divide to the western edges ofthe Hub. Most of the activity described occurredin the mountainous, forested landscapes ofthe Boulder Mountains, Garnet Mountains,Flint Creek Range, Sapphires and BitterrootMountains, with primary movement betweenthese ranges happening via riparian corridorslike the Clark Fork and Blackfoot River, orsmaller tributaries. Reports of grizzly east ofthe Continental Divide were less numerous, andalmost entirely restricted to the area betweenMarysville and the Elkhorn Mountains, and afew in the very northern Big Belt Mountains.The exception to this are the accounts ofgrizzly bear moving northward out of theYellowstone National Park area and into therugged Absaroka-Gallatin-Madison mountaincomplex. Biologists indirectly attributed thisprevalence of bear activity west of the Divide asdriven by habitat factors, including higher berryproduction, better vegetative forage due toincreased moistness. As ungulate populations areprolific throughout the Hub, vegetative qualityand density (i.e., cover habitat) may indeed bea factor rather than lack of animal prey. Grizzlybears are starting to be seen more regularlyin the southern parts of the Hub, particularlyin ranges like the Sapphires, Flint Creeks, andBoulders where they are known to occupy thenorthern extents of those same ranges.Contrary to grizzly, black bear were describedas occurring throughout the forested landscapesof the Hub both east and west of the Divide.Although most biologists described black bearsas able to be almost anywhere in the forestedor montane parkland landscape, their reportsdid indicate a higher occurrence of blacks bearsaround riparian drainages.Lynx occurrence in the Hub was mostly limitedto the northern areas between the ContinentalDivide and the western areas. There were someold trapping records that indicated that anoccasional lynx would make it into the isolatedranges east of the Continental Divide, but thisPotter Basin looking southwest to the BridgerRange, photo by Grace Hammond23