MPG Ranch Newsletter: Issue XIII

Our local mountains produced a dismal berry crop this year, so hunger is pulling bears from the high country. They’ve traded huckleberry slopes for creek bottoms and apple orchards, while devouring animal remains from the hunting season’s first harvests. Dumpsters that have sat untouched by bears for fifteen years now entice these ravenous omnivores.

Meanwhile, migrating birds paint their silhouettes across the sky, answering an ancient pull toward warmer country. Against September’s deep blue afternoons, Raptor View Research Institute scans the airspace, identifying waves of hawks, eagles, and falcons as they ride the thermals south.

Among the cottonwoods and willows on the floodplain below, the University of Montana Bird Ecology Lab quietly sets mist nets, catching and banding songbirds before letting them flutter away.

And across the ranch, MPG’s bird crew follows other migrations, banding owls beneath star-studded skies, hummingbirds among fading blossoms, and poorwills as warm evenings begin to cool.

For a few brief weeks each fall, the ranch becomes part of a much larger passage, a resting place, a feeding ground, and a waypoint along journeys that have crossed these valleys and mountains for generations.

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MPG Ranch promotes conservation through research, restoration, collaboration, and education.

MPG Ranch includes two research and conservation properties in western Montana. We employ more than a dozen researchers dedicated to studying plant and animal life within this magnificent landscape. That work helps us understand how complex ecological systems interact with each other and informs how we problem-solve to restore habitat where native species can once again thrive. We collaborate with and support a diverse mix of research organizations across Montana and throughout the western United States.