This article by Lee Lamb appears in the “Conserved Forever” department of the September/October 2026 issue of Bugle magazine. To read more Bugle articles, check out the digital previews (available to members and nonmembers) or log in to your My RMEF account for complete digital editions.
No matter how many times I travel along southwest Montana’s Highway 69 from Boulder to Whitehall, my breath still catches when the road curves south just before mile marker 25, and the peaks of the Tobacco Root Mountains materialize in the windshield. With each passing mile the beauty of the range unfolds, revealing subalpine forests plunging below craggy crests and snowy basins, sagebrush foothills rolling toward valley floors, and irrigated croplands approaching winding river bottoms.
Located about 40 miles west of Bozeman and flanked by the Madison, Jefferson and Ruby rivers, the Tobacco Roots are an island of sorts, spanning 26 miles from north to south and 18 miles east to west. Varied topography and habitats support diverse wildlife, including elk, white-tailed and mule deer, pronghorns, black bears, mountain goats and the occasional grizzly or Canada lynx. Two-lane highways ring the mountain range, connecting agricultural communities and providing access to its interior—managed largely by the U.S. Forest Service—for people seeking recreation and solitude on public lands.
The Tobacco Roots are believed to harbor the highest concentration of peaks over 10,000 feet in Montana. Of the 43 summits, Hollowtop Mountain stands the highest at 10,604 feet. Glacier-hollowed cirques cup cool, clear alpine lakes throughout the range. In 1895, the Board of Game and Fish Commissioners, a predecessor of Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks, began stocking native westslope cutthroat trout in many lakes across the Tobacco Roots for recreation and to provide help feed local miners, who in the early 1900s helped pack fish into the mountains and release them. FWP continues to stock many lakes in the range today.
Trout were the impetus behind my first foray into the Tobacco Roots as a kid in the early 1980s. My family dispersed camped along a Forest Service road, then climbed higher into the mountains, navigating our 4WD along a primitive two-track until we risked scraping bottom. We hiked the remaining half mile to our destination, an alpine lake at 8,865 feet, where we found plenty of bear sign, but very little of trout. The fish were shy that day, but I paid no heed: I was captivated by the sting of alpine snowmelt on bare legs as I waded in the lake, its waters so pristine I swore I could see bottom all the way across, where jagged peaks stood like sentinels reflecting on its surface.
Indigenous peoples—including the Shoshone, Flathead and Crow—seasonally hunted bison and gathered plants in and around the Tobacco Roots for thousands of years before the Corps of Discovery ventured through in 1805. This area remained largely unsettled until gold was discovered nearby in 1863, and a flood of prospectors and settlers spilled into the mountain range and surrounding valleys. Communities, farms and ranches sprang up to serve miners, most notably the town of Pony, which became the center for ore processing in the Tobacco Roots.
The mining boom busted in the 1920s, and the mountain range largely reverted to its former isolated state. The federal government incorporated large portions into the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest, and today these public lands are managed for their scenic and wildlife values, livestock grazing and recreation. Around the edges, family farms and ranches still grow hay, alfalfa, oats and cattle much like they did 160 years ago. But rural properties across the West are in high demand, and even here private lands are being swallowed up by subdivisions, roads and other development.
In 2024, one local landowner decided to take a different approach. Rather than sell to the highest bidder, RMEF member Paul Hunt approached the Elk Foundation with a desire to see his land—which had been in the family since the 1960s—conserved for the public by offering to sell it to the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest.
Located at the northwest end of the Tobacco Roots and bordering Forest Service lands on the east and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) lands on the south, the 396-acre Point of Rocks property is a mix of native grasslands and mountain foothills featuring curl-leaf mahogany, Douglas fir, Rocky Mountain juniper and limber pine. Elk, mule deer and moose winter there, and the parcel serves as year-round range and a migration corridor for pronghorns.
RMEF helped facilitate the sale between Hunt and the Forest Service, which also improved access to more than 2,757 acres of national forest and BLM lands that were difficult to reach because of rigorous terrain, opening additional opportunities for hunting, hiking and backpacking opportunities in the Tobacco Roots.
“We greatly appreciate Paul Hunt, for his desire to conserve this vital landscape. His family watched over and cared for this land for six decades. Now, it is in the public’s hands to hunt and otherwise use and enjoy,” says RMEF President and CEO Kyle Weaver.