In a landmark victory for wilderness protection, U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy ruled in favor of Wilderness Watch and struck down the Forest Service’s approval of a plan by Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks (FWP) to poison more than 45 miles of Buffalo Creek in the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness north of Yellowstone National Park.
Judge Molloy found the project violated the Wilderness Act in several ways and reaffirmed the letter and spirit of the law, stating “…the Wilderness Act mandates the preservation of wilderness character.” Styled as an effort to expand Yellowstone cutthroat trout populations, the project would have involved a decade’s worth of helicopter landings, plus the use of other motorized equipment to poison and kill fish, amphibians, and insects in numerous lakes, ponds, wetlands, and nearly 50 miles of high-mountain wilderness streams. After poisoning the watershed with the toxic chemical rotenone, FWP planned to stock the naturally fishless streams and lakes with cutthroat trout. The judge rejected the Forests Service’s claims that the project would restore natural conditions in the Wilderness, pointing out that because the watershed was naturally fishless, "the wilderness neither depended on Yellowstone cutthroat trout for ecological balance nor contributed them to the watershed as a whole. As a result, conserving them serves no wilderness purpose." "This is one of the most important rulings for protecting the integrity of the Wilderness Act in the law’s 60-year history. The idea that managers can substitute their desired conditions for what Nature provides in these wild places threatens to destroy the profound values that set Wilderness areas apart," said Wilderness Watch’s executive director, George Nickas. "Judge Molloy’s thoroughly reasoned Order spells out precisely why the agency’s misguided aims are fundamentally at odds with the law. Every manager who oversees Wilderness needs to read and understand it." "This ruling reaffirms that Wilderness wasn’t designated by Congress to serve as a staging area for agency manipulation," said Wilderness Watch staff attorney Dan Brister. "The court recognized what the Act requires—wilderness areas must remain self-willed." "With rapidly mounting pressures on our most protected landscapes, Judge Molloy’s opinion marks an essential line in the sand for Wilderness," said Dana Johnson, attorney and policy director for Wilderness Watch. "In Wilderness, restraint is a core statutory imperative."
Click here to read Judge Molloy’s Order.
A special thank you to nearly 15,000 of our members and supporters who submitted public comments back in 2021 against the Forest Service and MT FWP's plan to invade the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness with poisons, helicopters, and other motorized equipment. Your actions and support helped lay the groundwork for our successful lawsuit! |
