Accomplishments
Since our inception in 1989, Wilderness Watch has played an important role in assuring that management agencies abide by the Wilderness Act and other laws that protect the integrity of our wilderness heritage. Here’s a quick look at a few of our accomplishments:
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Wilderness Watch stops poisoning plan in Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness
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.
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Court rules Western wolves wrongly denied Endangered Species Act protections
On August 5, 2025, Federal District Judge Donald Molloy vacated the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (USFWS) 2024 determination that gray wolves in the Western U.S. do not warrant Endangered Species Act (ESA) protections and remanded the matter for a new decision.
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Great news for the Okefenokee Wilderness and National Wildlife Refuge
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) has finalized a decision to expand the acquisition boundary of the 407,000-acre Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) in Georgia by 22,000 acres. This means the agency can now negotiate to purchase lands within the expanded boundary to be added to the refuge, which protects one of the world’s…
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Georgia Governor rejects commercial spaceport threatening Cumberland Island Wilderness
A proposed commercial space launch site that would have been located less than five miles from the Cumberland Island National Seashore and Wilderness in southern Georgia has been scrapped by Georgia Governor Brian Kemp. On May 13, 2024, Gov. Kemp signed a law that dissolves the Camden County Spaceport Authority, putting an end to the…
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Red Rock Lakes Wilderness pipeline project withdrawn
On September 15, 2023, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service withdrew a controversial water-diversion pipeline project in the Red Rock Lakes Wilderness in southwestern Montana following a lawsuit by Wilderness Watch, Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Gallatin Wildlife Association, and Yellowstone to Uintas Connection.
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Good News for the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness
Wilderness Watch supported two recent moves by the Biden administration to stop a massive underground and open-pit copper-nickel sulfide-ore mine—some of the most toxic mining on the planet—in the watershed of the fabled Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW) in northeastern Minnesota. In January 2022, the administration canceled two mining leases for the proposed Twin…
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Wildernesses spared from burn plan
Due to pressure from Wilderness Watch and Western Watersheds Project, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has decided to scrap its misguided plan to torch the sagebrush habitat and native pinyon-juniper forests of the remote Highland Ridge and White Rock Range Wildernesses in eastern Nevada to create more food for cows.
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Water won’t run uphill
Due to pressure from Wilderness Watch, Western Watersheds Project, and other groups, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has decided to scrap a water development project in the Paiute Wilderness in northwest Arizona. This project, whose purpose was to facilitate cattle grazing, would have added significant structures in the Paiute Wilderness and would have disrupted a…
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You made a difference for Wilderness in CA
Thanks to comments from our members and supporters, the Forest Service (FS) has issued a draft Environmental Assessment that excludes Wilderness, Wilderness Study Areas, recommended Wilderness, and roadless areas from its Region 5 Post Disturbance Hazardous Tree Management Project. This project could have included more than a dozen Wildernesses within the sprawling project area across 10 National Forests…
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Good news for brown bears in the Kenai Refuge
On November 13, 2020, a federal court ruled in favor of protecting brown bears in the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) and Wilderness in Alaska. The Kenai National Wildlife Refuge includes approximately 2 million acres of important wildlife habitat and more than 1.3 million acres of Wilderness.
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Victory for Owyhee Canyonlands!
On January 13, 2022, an administrative law judge blocked a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) decision that would have allowed for up to triple the amount of cattle grazing on public lands in part of the wild and remote Owyhee Canyonlands region of southwestern Idaho, including in Wilderness. Wilderness Watch and Western Watersheds Project challenged BLM’s…
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Scapegoat Wilderness poisoning stopped
On July 22, 2021, Wilderness Watch and allies filed suit in the U.S. District Court for Montana asking for a preliminary injunction and/or temporary restraining order to halt the State of Montana’s North Fork Blackfoot Westslope Cutthroat Trout Project—a massive stream poisoning and fish stocking project in the Scapegoat Wilderness
Photo: Cumberland Island Wilderness, Georgia by Jessica Howell-Edwards