ENVIRONMENT & OUTDOORS

Humility in the mountains Gaining avalanche knowledge for safe travel in the mountains

BY MIRA BRODY

TOBACCO ROOT MOUNTAINS – The rhythmic sound of 10 sets of skins bounces off the limber pines as we glide along a narrow track of packed snow. Under clear sunlight, pillowy powder is mounded across the imposing peaks of the Tobacco Root Mountains which welcome us into their embrace. We will eat, sleep and work in this wild landscape for three days of undistracted, immersive learning.

I am one of eight students accompanying two guides with Big Sky Backcountry Guides who are leading us up the 2.5-mile, 1,600-elevation gain skin to the Bell Lake Yurt to earn our Avalanche 1 certification.

For those who recreate during the winter in Montana’s many mountain ranges, avalanches are a very real threat. The 2020-21 winter season saw a recordmatching mortality rate, with 36 avalanche-caused deaths recorded in the U.S. Two occurred in Montana, one locally in Beehive Basin. Winter backcountry sports is a game of risk versus reward—the pull of those wide-open mountains of fresh powder you earn, weighed against the risk of losing a friend, or your own life.

A yurt permit has existed in the Tobacco Roots, a 43-peak range sandwiched between the Jefferson and Madison rivers, for around 40 years under various ownership. Drew Pogge, owner and lead guide of BSBG has skied the Tobacco Roots for years. He was a patron of the yurt while on assignment with Backcountry Magazine before he jokingly asked the previous owners if they were looking to sell.

What started as a joke turned into reality in 2008 when Pogge—who was teaching at Montana State University at the time and looking for a career change—was offered the sale. He saw an opportunity to bring the yurt to life, initiating cosmetic and functionality updates so it could be used as a classroom and comfortable place to enjoy the backcountry.

Now in its ninth season with Pogge and BSBG, the Bell Lake Yurt has been the hub through which many adventure-seekers have gained the knowledge necessary to stay educated and safe in the beautiful, treacherous mountain ranges of Montana.

“I’ve been avalanched a couple times in my career as a skier,” Pogge said. He’s a longtime member of the American Avalanche Association, a nonprofit devoted to avalanche safety education and outreach, and has taught avalanche courses for most of his life.

“Once I sort of figured it out and sought out education elsewhere, it opened my eyes to not only how dangerous the backcountry can be but also how easy it is to manage once you get the proper education,” Pogge said.

As we approach the yurt, our guides pause and point to a ridgeline jutting off from the prominent Long Mountain. The slope will be the site of our field education and we will later learn it’s between 34 and 45 degrees steep; prime avalanche terrain. One of the guides, Shannon Regan, explains there was a fatality here back in 2019 due to a persistent weak layer that slid, throwing two of the four men on a self-guided tour down the mountain, killing one and severely inuring the other. According to our guides, the average amount of snow you’ll be shoveling to retrieve a buried partner after an avalanche is between one and two tons. The gravity of that statistic weighs on our minds during day two of our course. We’re standing along the side of the mountain we’ve just skinned up in snow pits we’ve dug. The crest of each pit reaches the tops of even the tallest student’s head and wind gusts peak at around 45 mph. My fingers and toes are completely numb.

Inside our pits, we conduct a series of snow stability tests: identifying weak layers by poking the snow with our fingers, hand and fist; the compression test, a series of methodic arm taps atop a shovel to test the weight- and impact-bearing ability of the snowpack; and the extended column test, pulling an isolated snow column toward us to see where exactly it breaks free. All of these tests gather data about the characteristics of the snow and ultimately help determine our decision about whether or not the snowpack is safe to ski on.

While there are many courses that offer the same information, there’s nothing quite like being in the mountains while doing it. The two-mile-long skin up to our practice site raises the stakes and makes the rescue drills feel that much more real.

“As soon as you step out of the yurt, you’re in avy territory,” Pogge said. “It’s virtually impossible to show people how to travel in avy terrain if you’re not in avy terrain. You can’t approximate it in a parking lot or ski area. It’s about practicing traveling through it with guides who can explain the real questions you have as they come up.”

Guides Nicolas Westfall and Shannon Regan demonstrate a fine search beacon rescue. PHOTO BY MIRA BRODY

When a long day of lessons are over, students take some time to relax with a round of games in the yurt. PHOTO BY MIRA BRODY

in recreation since the 1990s, death statistics have remained relatively flat, “a huge win for avalanche education and safety,” Pogge says.

Later that night we sit huddled around the yurt dinner table, warm mugs of tea and coffee cupped in our hands. Regan is in the kitchen prepping garlic bread for roasting while marinara sauce bubbles away in a large pot. After a long day on the mountain, the smell of fresh, homemade food is unparalled.

Our second guide, Nicolas Westfall, is at the head of the room with a whiteboard in his hand, teaching us about the human factor of avalanche risk. While snowpack and weather are all very important datapoints when mitigating risk in the backcountry, it is the decisions we make as humans that determine whether an outing turns deadly.

Pogge says a reoccurring theme with every avalanche report he studies in the U.S. is that for the most part, they are completely predictable based on snow pack and human decisions made beforehand. As humans, it’s our job to be informed and use our own judgment to recognize unstable conditions before they cause a fatality. According to Pogge, a lot of avalanche fatalities involve highly experienced people, and as we develop better, lighter, faster gear, our risk only increases.

“Humility is one of the biggest things that keeps people in the mountains long term,” Pogge said. “That’s something I’ve definitely learned as the cocky 18-year-old moving to Bozeman thinking I’m going to be a badass in the mountains. The mountains are pretty good at smacking us down and reminding us of who is in charge.”

On our final day at the yurt, our class stands on a small level portion of the mountain called Picnic Bench with Upper Peanut Butter Bowl above us. The frozen Bell Lake glistens below and the sun threatens to peek through the otherwise overcast skies. We munch on sandwiches as we transition from uphill to downhill gear. A long morning of planning—mapping out our route, checking the weather and avalanche forecast, and packing the appropriate gear—preceded our arrival to Picnic Bench.

"Learning about avalanches is a lifelong endeavor,” Pogge said. “Every time I go out, I learn something new about the snow or mountains or myself … really the idea is to get better every day. These are perishable skills.”

We clip into our bindings and take turns snaking our way through the fresh, untouched powder down to our meeting spot by the shore of the lake. The lessons we’ve learned—the meticulous pre-planning and decision-making and intricacies of snow science—are fresh in our minds as we take flight down the mountain, leaving the yurt one last time on our ski down to Petosi Campground where society awaits once more.

There are five red flags to watch for in the backcountry:

1. Recent avalanche activity 2. Cracking or whoomphing 3. Recent snow or rain

accumulation (about 12 inches in 24 hours)

4. Rapid thawing 5. Wind loading

Beacon park opens in Big Sky

BY BELLA BUTLER

BIG SKY – Following the 2021-22 winter season that matched the national record for avalanche deaths in the U.S., community partners on Jan. 15 unveiled a newly established beacon park in Big Sky to provide local education and increase avalanche awareness and safety.

Funded by Big Sky-based contractor Cornerstone Management Services, the beacon park creates an opportunity for backcountry users to search for buried transceivers to hone their beacon skills so if the time comes to perform a rescue, they’re proficient with their gear. The park, currently made up of four buried transceivers, is located at the softball fields at the Big Sky Community Park and is free and open to the public. Avalanche transceivers, or beacons, are worn during travel through the backcountry and are used to locate victims who are buried by avalanches. The survival rate for victims buried beneath an avalanche drops significantly after 15 minutes. As a partner performing a rescue, time is of the essence, and a life is at stake. Executing each component of a rescue efficiently is critical, beginning with the beacon search.

“In stressful situations, we as humans perform at the level of our training,” said Matt Zia with Friends of the Gallatin National Forest Avalanche Center. “If we train to a really high level then we’re going to be ready to perform in those stressful situations of an avalanche rescue.”

Currently the only beacon park in Big Sky is located at the base of the Challenger lift at Big Sky Resort, which requires a lift ticket and the ability to ski a blue run to access. According to Andy Dreisbach, owner of CMS and a volunteer with Gallatin County Sheriff Search and Rescue Big Sky Section, broader access was a key consideration for the new beacon park. When choosing a location, Dreisbach said the team at CMS ruled out popular backcountry areas and instead opted for the community park which is “immediately centralized for everybody,” according to Dreisbach.

The Big Sky Community Organization, which is lending the land for the park, hosted the park’s opening day on Jan. 15, which was attended by approximately 10 people and included demonstrations by GNFAC. BSCO Youth Program Manager Richard Sandza said the main goal of the event was to connect people to their resources and open the park to the community.

The concept for the park originated in 2020 when then Lone Peak High School senior Laney Smith proposed the park to community funding partners. Since then, CMS has taken the seed planted by Smith and brought the $12,000 project to fruition.

Having performed many rescues as a search and rescue volunteer, Dreisbach said general backcountry knowledge is important, but practice is the tandem component, and an active avalanche search is “not really the time to practice.”

The other piece of this, according to Dreisbach, is understanding the difference between owning gear and knowing how to use it, a distinction many avalanche safety instructors open introductory courses with.

“Ownership does not warrant knowledge, if you will,” Dreisbach said. “Practice and purposeful practice give you the basis for that knowledge.”

On Jan. 15, participants in the BSCO Avalanche Awareness event watch a probe demonstration in the new Big Sky Beacon Park. PHOTO BY JOSEPH T. O’CONNOR

CELEBRATE WINTER IN THE HEART OF BIG SKY

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 3

5 pm | Viking XC Ski Race | Big Sky Resort Nordic Center

SPACE STILL AVAILABLE!

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 4

3 pm | Frozen Foot Obstacle Course | BASE Community Center

NO REGISTRATION NECESSARY, JUST SHOW UP!

4 pm | Ice Sculpting Demonstration | Town Center Plaza

FREE EVENT, STOP ON BY!

6 - 7:30 pm | Retro Movie Night | The Independent

Featuring Scot Schmidt and Dan Egan and Warren Miller Movie Clips

SOLD OUT

7 - 9 pm | Silent Disco | Town Center Plaza | Music provided by Daniel Kern and Beacon Collective

FREE FAMILY-FRIENDLY EVENT, SWING BY!

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 5

9 am - 4 pm | Winter Fest Ice Sculpting Competition | Town Center Plaza

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12 pm - 4 pm | Best of the West Skijoring Competition | Town Center

TICKETS AVAILABLE ONLINE AND WALK-UP DAY OF EVENT

6 pm | Skijoring Calcutta, 406 Agave Ice Bar | Tips Up

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7 pm - 9 pm | Winter Street Dance, featuring FORESTER, Opening act Big Sky local DJs Jenn n Juice & Chance Lenay | Town Center Plaza

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SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 6

11 am - 4 pm | Best of the West Skijoring Championship | Town Center

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According to ecologist Pepper Trail, humans have unleashed the fire-predator with our choices such as greenhouse gas emissions and land management among others. PHOTO BY ALEKSANDR LESIK/ADOBE STOCK

A new predator stalks the West

BY PEPPER TRAIL

WRITERS ON THE RANGE

The grizzly bear. The wolf. The cougar. These magnificent creatures, apex predators, how can we not admire them? People cross the world for the opportunity to see one in the wilds of Yellowstone or Alaska.

There, we view them from a distance, free to indulge our awe in safety. It has been a long time since Americans lived in fear of wild beasts.

But now that fear has returned. Fear felt not just in the woods, but also in cities and towns: Paradise, California; Talent, Oregon; and now in suburban Superior and Louisville in Colorado’s Boulder County.

The dangerous predator we’re facing these days is wildfire, charging even out of grasslands to destroy our very homes. And no one is safe.

As an ecologist, I know that predators are essential to the health of wildlife communities, keeping prey populations in check. They’re also a driving force in evolution, favoring the faster or stronger or smarter animals able to escape their attacks. Of course, civilization long ago freed us from the evolutionary pressure exerted by predators. But that freedom has come at a cost.

When populations and ecosystems grow badly out of balance, there must come a correction. Humans and the environments we have created are not immune to this rule, and we must recognize that we have unleashed the fire-predator through our own choices.

What choices? On the global scale, we have released vast amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. This was done at first in ignorance, but for at least the past 30 years, it truly was a choice made in the face of increasingly desperate warnings.

The resulting greenhouse effect has raised temperatures and decreased rain and snowpack throughout the West, contributing to “fire weather” like the hurricane-force winds that shockingly bore down on the suburbs of Denver in the dead of winter. wildland fires everywhere, and ending the use of prescribed fire in forests as a management tool. This led to a huge build-up of flammable fuels.

Second, industrial-scale logging eliminated over 90 percent of fire-resistant old-growth forests and replaced them with highly flammable tree plantations. Finally, we vastly expanded our human footprint, building houses right where the fire-predator likes to roam, at the brink of forests and grasslands.

Reconciling ourselves to the depredations of wildfire requires that we take the long view – the really long view. The fuel-choked forests resulting from our (mis)management need to burn, and they will burn. The best we can do is to preserve the old forests that remain and manage younger forests to increase their resilience to moderate-intensity fire. It could be a century or more before a new forestland equilibrium is reached, one with lower fuel loads, better adapted to the high fire-frequency climate we have created.

Meanwhile, what about us? Colorado’s Marshall Fire proved that wildfire is the one predator we can’t eliminate. Far from any forest, this was pushed through tinder-dry grasslands by howling winter winds and burned more than 1,000 suburban homes in a matter of hours. So, like any prey species, we must adapt as best we can. As individuals, we can create defensible space around our homes. We can get skilled at escaping wildfire by having evacuation plans ready.

As a society, we can adopt sensible policies to limit sprawling development in fire-prone areas. Recent events prove that these include not just remote forestlands, but even grasslands near suburbs. Faced with predators, animals try to get into the center of the herd. We need to do the same, avoiding exposure to the fire-predator at the vulnerable edge.

Finally, we can — we must — embark on an urgent global effort to end the burning of fossil fuels within the next few decades. If we do not, the West will face year-round fire weather, and a future at the mercy of fire.

Yet there is reason for hope: the uniquely human capacity for rapid social and cultural evolution. Let’s harness that strength, and work toward the day when fire is a predator no more, but our powerful partner in the stewardship of the land.

Love thy neighbors

BY EMILY STIFLER WOLFE

EBS CONTRIBUTOR

Thirteen stunning photographs of area wildlife grace the downhill-facing side of the new Swift Current 6 chairlift seatbacks. The chairback photos are the biggest display yet of the Forever Project, an initiative by Big Sky Resort’s parent company, Boyne Resorts, committing all of its 13 properties to sustainable business practices, including reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2030. Each of the three stories in this series focuses on one of the photographers—their work, their stories, and their passion for protecting the Greater Yellowstone.

Near the top of the whitebark pine tree, the black bear sow reached for a pine cone with her open mouth. Grabbing it, she dropped it to the ground to eat later. Nearby, her cubs picked at the cones, learning to harvest the high-fat, high-protein nuts so important for survival. This wouldn’t be an uncommon occurrence in the backcountry of Yellowstone National Park. Except it wasn’t in the backcountry. The tree was next to a guardrail, and 20 feet below the sow, people watched, standing on Dunraven Pass Road, a high point on Yellowstone’s Grand Loop Road. Without a ranger present, the crowd continued growing. “It’s unusual for a mama bear to put her cubs so close to the road and stay when so many people approach so close,” said Big Sky-based wildlife photographer Patty Bauchman, who came upon the scene one fall day in 2016. Bauchman was horrified, but didn’t yet understand why the bears were willing to come so close to the road. “Photography led me to find out more,” she said. What she learned was that whitebark pine are a “keystone species,” meaning many animals and environmental functions depend on them and that the trees have been devastated by mountain pine beetles, blister rust and climate change, and that mama bear was desperate for the whitebark’s fat-rich nuts. Previously owner and operator of horse farms in North Carolina and Las Vegas, Bauchman has visited Big Sky since 1981, introduced to the area by her husband, John, whose father’s business installed the first power lines to the resort. When they retired here in 2010, Bauchman dove into photography. Part of the International League of Conservation Photographers, Bauchman has contributed images to conservation groups and now has work hanging in the Bozeman-Yellowstone International Airport. “When you get into wildlife photography, you can’t help but care about their environment,” Bauchman said. “I want to use my images to build awareness and help effect positive change.”

Photographer Patty Bauchman has contributed images to conservation groups and now has work hanging in the Bozeman- Bauchman said she captured the image of this fox in Big Sky while it was hunting in an empty lot. PHOTO BY Yellowstone International Airport. PATTY BAUCHMAN PHOTO COURTESY OF PATTY BAUCHMAN in an empty lot, and it wasn’t paying any attention to me, because I was in my car. I refer to it as my car blind. But then somebody else drove by and the fox stopped for that moment and looked my way. Foxes are quite prevalent here. A lot of people enjoy having them around, and some may have fed them. Feeding wildlife is illegal in Montana, and it’s a big issue in Big Sky, especially bears. ESF: Why is that a problem? PB: Fish, Wildlife & Parks will sometimes relocate a black bear that has been captured in a neighborhood, and relocate it to more remote locations. But once a bear is habituated, they’ll euthanize it. This summer, we had multiple bears that got into unsecured trash cans so many times that when the neighborhood called to report it, they were euthanized instead of being relocated. ESF: But aren’t all trash cans bear-proof in Big Sky now? PB: Many, but not all. Often, it’s [people] who may not understand. They’ll have scads of garbage, and the trash can lid won’t close, and that’s just an invitation to bears.

Q&A WITH PATTY BAUCHMAN

ESF: Pikas are one of my favorite animals. Where did you take that photo? PB: That was in the northern tier of Yellowstone. Pikas are another very important critter in terms of climate change. They’re highly affected by warming temperatures, and since they already live at higher elevation, they have nowhere to go for relief. They’re like a canary in the coal mine.

ESW: And the pine marten photo? PB: A group of youngsters was having a ball jumping on each other and running around, snow flying. They’re pretty rare to see, so that was really fun to see. It was in Yellowstone, and it’s the only one I’ve seen other than in my backyard.

ESW: Why wildlife photography? PB: I love living so close to Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Park, and then finding wildlife so prevalent in Big Sky, like the herds of elk in our neighborhood. I’ll be headed to Yellowstone before it’s even light, and as soon as I turn on Lone [Mountain] Trail, boom. I brake because there’s a big bull elk in the road. I think, ‘huh I’m going to Yellowstone to photograph the elk rut, and here it is right down the street.’

ESW: Have you seen any accidents? PB: The elk often cross Lone [Mountain] Trail on the curves above Lone Mountain Ranch and below Antler Ridge. I see them hit there often. I wish there could be an underpass or overpass like they have in Canada.

Emily Stifler Wolfe: Tell me the story of that gorgeous fox image. Patty Bauchman: The fox I love, because it was in Big Sky. I was watching it hunt

ESW: How does this work influence and inspire you? PB: It’s fun to connect with other like minded photographers and see what they do, conservation-wise. I always want to do more, see more, experience more, and help more.

Find more of Patty Bauchman’s work at patriciabauchmanphotography.com and on instagram @pbauchmanphotography. Read more about the Forever Project and the photographers involved in the Swift Current 6 chairlift chairbacks here.

Strategy and tactics trump technique

BY DAN EGAN

EBS COLUMNIST

Many skiers are focused on their technique. They want to improve and firmly believe that if the technique is mastered, they can then tackle more difficult terrain. But these skiers are missing two key elements of the sport: strategy and tactics.

What do I mean by strategy and tactics? Well, to simplify the statement, what is your plan? When looking down a mogul field, glades, powder slope or chute I would argue an intermediate skier can enjoy these types of runs with a strong strategy and focused tactics on where to go and why to go there. In other words, having a purpose and moving in the direction of that purpose is more powerful than technique.

At my camps and clinics, I’ve been able to take skiers of all abilities into incredible terrain, incredible powder runs, through breath-taking scenery and often their technique is far from perfect. This is always accomplished through planning, having a strategy for where and how to enter a slope and having the tactics of building confidence in simple skills of traversing, stopping and safely changing direction.

Let’s start at the top as it can often be the most intimidating. Rather than staring off the top thinking you must make perfect turns from the get-go, find a way in, stop, take a couple of deep breaths, look around and develop a plan for the next few turns.

If it’s a mogul trail, search out the side of the trail where there are likely to be more rhythmic lines and rounder shaped moguls, rather than the middle of the mogul trail which tends to be chaotic with choppy bumps and deep ruts. In this case the strategy would be don’t ski the middle of the trail.

Now consider dropping into a steep chute. Entering onto the slope tactically could determine the entire run. Often the lower entrance will avoid cornices, or maybe a rut that is formed. Or there might be an option of skiing along the ridge prior to dropping in and finding untracked snow then maybe a traverse into the middle of the chute and through the gut. Here the strategy would be finding the smoothest entrance, get to the middle of the chute and chill for a bit, then have a clear plan on how many turns you want to make and where you will stop. Or how about glades? Rather than dropping right off the top and accelerating around a clump of trees, maybe there is a traverse to take into a small clearing. From there you can decide your line by looking for alleyways down the fall line that provide the best options and locations for stopping where needed.

In all these examples the key is to provide yourself the best chance for success by easing your way onto a slope or run, shaking off any tension and developing a plan that works for you.

One of the most important tactics I teach is having a starting and stopping point and breaking the mogul run, steep slope or glades into sections. It is important not to be overly aggressive on the distance you ski. Remember, if you feel comfortable making three or four good solid turns and stopping then do that. Most skiers get into trouble making too many turns and have no idea what a good stopping point is, mainly because they haven’t thought about it.

By breaking the run into sections, you gain confidence in having a beginning and end to each section. Over time as you get comfortable on a certain run you can lengthen the distance you ski. It is always better to make four great turns, stop and continue than to blow the fifth turn, lose your balance and fall on the sixth one.

Now consider the most important strategy of all: imperfection. Even the best of skiers can’t make 100 percent perfect turns. I once asked a World Cup racer after they won a race how many perfect turns they made that day. They answered, “maybe 50 percent.” Imagine if one of the best skiers in the world won a World Cup race with 50 percent perfect turns, us mere mortals are having the run of our lives if we are making 20 percent to 30 percent perfect turns.

In other words, lighten up on yourself. If you make a bad turn, don’t let it contaminate the next good one. By adopting the strategy of imperfection and being less critical of your technique over time you might start to enjoy the journey.

Extreme skiing pioneer Dan Egan skis through moguls demonstrating his advice to find a rhythmic line with rounder shaped moguls. PHOTO BY JEN BENNETT/ RUMBLE PRODUCTIONS

Extreme Skiing Pioneer, Dan Egan coaches and teaches at Big Sky Resort during the winter. His 2022 steeps camps at Big Sky Resort run Feb. 24-26, March 10-12 and March 17-19. His newest book, “Thirty Years in a White Haze” was released in March 2021 and is available at www.White-Haze.com.

Gallatin Canyon book brings timely appreciation for busy corridor

BY TODD WILKINSON

EBS COLUMNIST

In a region known for its scenic drives through the mountains, this one, too, ranks right up there, wending literally along the banks of a blue-ribbon trout stream, connecting the fastest growing micropolitan area in America to a quainter western entrance to Yellowstone National Park.

Two-lane U.S. Highway 191 is a marvel of engineering that’s about to get a major upgrade and yet, paradoxically, the more conducive it becomes to carrying higher loads of traffic, the poorer it bodes for the wild sense of nature through which it circuits.

Nothing transforms wild places more, eminent conservation biologist Reed Noss has said, than a road built into previously little-developed landscapes. Indeed, the bulging presence of Big Sky, which is steadily displacing one of the last great concentrations of large mammals in the Lower 48, would not exist were it not for U.S. Highway 191.

Ranked among the most dangerous roads in Montana, with white cross markers adorning its asphalt, and every year notching grim statistics related to roadkilled elk, deer, bighorn sheep, bears and even wandering pets, Highway 191 has a notorious reputation, especially during icy winters.

And yet this stretch, which brazen semi drivers use as a shortcut for hauling freight, also has a storied history, one recounted with brilliant and inspiring detail by Gallatin Canyon resident Duncan T. Patten. Patten’s book, “The Gallatin Way to Yellowstone” has been sitting on my desk for a while, becoming dog-eared and marked up with highlighted passages from its pages.

Long before Highway 191 became the hair-raising experience it can be, parts of it were old trails for indigenous people moving to and from the mountains we know today as the Gallatins and the interior of what became Yellowstone. Subsequently, after Yellowstone was founded 150 years ago in 1872, it was given the poetic sounding moniker, “The Gallatin Way” and it became the focus of continuous upgrades. First it was turned into a muddy pathway for stagecoaches, advocated by the Bozeman Chamber of Commerce, to give tourists a shortcut to the back west door of the world’s first national park and its geyser fields. Then it provided access for dude ranches, livestock growers, prospectors and timber people. Over time, it became an economic lifeline, of sorts, and then, following the birth of Big Sky, a road underbuilt for the high volume of traffic it holds—levels that today resemble the bumper-to-bumper commuter traffic of any urban suburb.

Unfortunately, state and federal highway engineers who now want to straighten, widen and expand the footprint of U.S. Highway 191 also stand accused of being callous, or at best indifferent, to the added negative impacts of their work.

One passage struck me in the early pages of Patten’s book: “Long-term residents of the canyon and locations farther south often viewed Big Sky as a blemish on the beauty of the canyon, while others now see it as an integral part of today’s canyon and the Gallatin Way,” Patten writes. “Change is normal—everything changes over time; thus, how the canyon and the Gallatin Way have changed is a lesson to recognize that we ‘cannot burn back the clock.’”

Lest anyone mistake Patten’s intention, he is not a booster for the kind of development that continues to erupt largely unchecked in the Gallatin Canyon, nor is he condoning the thoughtless forms of commerce that continue to exact a toll. He is imploring all of us to pay better attention, to appreciate the canyon not as a Colorado-like thoroughfare leading to a major resort, but heed that this road actually passes through the northwestern corner of Yellowstone National Park.

As I often do, let’s highlight the significance of this: Yellowstone and the Gallatin Range hold all of the major mammals that were on the landscape prior to the arrival of Europeans on the continent. Patten wants travelers to take stock of this as they motor through the canyon—slowing down, being more attentive and knowledgeable, soaking in that amazing fact.

Patten is not only a fine writer; he’s an astute ecological thinker, counted among the best in the West. Wielding a specialty in hydro-ecology, he’s known for examining how river ecosystems—the most biologically rich parts of landscapes—function. During his career, he’s been involved with a number of different studies on Greater Yellowstone issues undertaken by the prestigious National Academies of Sciences.

Most of all, Patten, his wife, Eva, and their family have been denizens of the Gallatin Canyon, owning a historic ranch themselves and their care for the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem has turned them into avid conservationists.

It’s fair to say that likely the majority of people, who cumulatively log millions of miles passing through the Gallatin Canyon every year, are unfamiliar with the history of how the road beneath their tires came to be. Patten’s book and its trove of imagery provides a fascinating remedy for their lack of awareness and ought to be required reading for all public land managers, realtors, developers, and anyone headed to ski, hike, hunt, fish, ride mountain bike or horseback, or even race between Bozeman and West Yellowstone.

“The Gallatin Way to Yellowstone” invites us to ponder how we can secure more respectful treatment of nature by pondering the past and should be on every bookshelf.

Todd Wilkinson is the founder of Bozemanbased Mountain Journal and a correspondent for National Geographic. He authored the book “Grizzlies of Pilgrim Creek,” featuring photography by famed wildlife photographer Thomas D. Mangelsen, about Grizzly Bear 399.