In 2009 a riparian restoration project was scheduled to be implemented in the Wigwam Creek drainage in the Gravelly Mountains of Southwest Montana on the Beaverhead Deerlodge National Forest, Madison Ranger District. This project, while well intentioned, was missing a crucial component; the involvement of the allotment permittee. Although funding had been secured and improvement sites located and mapped out, the project was inevitably put on hold. In 2010, a meeting between the permittee, Range Management Specialist, and Fisheries Biologist was held. Once the permittee was involved, a vested interest was developed, a consensus was reached, and the Wigwam Project was again under way. This project had many components; waterlines, troughs, fencing, livestock, and native trout?.but most importantly, a partnership forged among an unlikely cast of characters. In spite of an atmosphere of distrust between the ranching community, government agencies, and conservation minded organizations, they were able to work together to complete the project. This is the real story, although range improvements and stream restoration are the tangible results, it is this meeting of the minds that is by far the true "Agency Success Story" that we would like to share.
Oral presentation and poster titles, abstracts, and authors from the Society for Range Management (SRM) Annual Meetings and Tradeshows, from 2013 forward.