Badger-Two Medicine Plan kudos

To the editor,

Thank you, Lewis and Clark Forest and Pikuni (Blackfeet) Nation, for the new Badger-Two Medicine Travel Plan.

"The Badger" is our back yard. For years we've picnicked, fished, hiked and snowshoed there.

We're not Blackfeet, but we too know the Badger is special.

Miki is 3 years old. In "the Badger" she's learned a quaking aspen from a lodgepole pine. She tells, from its tracks, which direction the hare ran, and from its scat distinguishes moose sign from grouse. She likes to lie in the sun, suck thimbleberries and point where a grizzly clawed the aspen trunks. The Badger-Two Medicine is her home, her school and her joy.

One sunny day last fall, walking the ridge above Buffalo Lakes, we heard something new. We'd neither seen nor talked about ATVs, but Miki got scared and began crying. "Let's go home, Daddy!" she urged. Then the ATV was upon us. As Miki covered her ears, the rider and I spoke.

He was off-trail, illegal. He'd been removing Forest Service obstacles to ATV travel along a re-seeded strip. As he left, Miki asked, "Why is he driving here?"

The Badger-Two Medicine is rare country. There're no real roads here, and, most days, no roar of internal combustion. For the sun, wind, grizzly, elk, wolf, bighorn, lynx, eagle, harlequin,

Blackfeet, and for Miki, it's home. Thank you, Lewis and Clark Forest and Blackfeet Nation, for a forest travel plan that promises a wild Badger-Two Medicine for our children and for everyone.

Kendall Flint, M.D., president

Glacier-Two Medicine Alliance

East Glacier Park