Grizzly Bears

Gov. Greg Gianforte celebrated U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s initial finding while environmentalists cast doubt on the state’s ability to manage the Montana state animal.

Montana’s hot real estate market is making it harder and more expensive to conserve grizzly bear habitats. Nonprofit conservation groups trying to connect isolated bear populations face the challenge of a growing human population and the rising cost of land.

There were 47 grizzly bear mortalities in northwest Montana this year, which is just below the record-breaking numbers from the recent past. Experts say some of those bears appeared to have a brain disease which has not been seen in this population.

Federal agencies announced their plans to reintroduce grizzly bears — some possibly from northwest Montana — into the northern Cascade Mountains in Washington.

Yellowstone officials say a pilot conducting wildlife research on Monday saw an adult bear walking in a meadow in the west-central part of the park.

The lawsuit filed by the Center for Biological Diversity says the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service didn’t properly assess the impact of a rule opening 2.3 million acres in the National Wildlife Refuge system to hunting and fishing.

DNA results confirm the bear killed by state wildlife officials July 9 was the same bear who fatally attacked a camper in Ovando just over a week ago.

Authorities say a grizzly bear attacked and killed a person camping in western Montana early Tuesday.

More than a half dozen wildlife bills have been signed into law, all with a similar vision for Montana: they suggest that there are too many predators on the landscape — and that numbers of animals like wolves and grizzly bears need to be reduced. Now, questions are proliferating over the future of predators in Montana. How that future looks lies at the intersection of law, values, and living with those species on the ground.

Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks specialists Tuesday killed an adult female grizzly and its yearling due to their history of livestock depredation in the Haskill Basin area near Whitefish.