Bob Marshall Wilderness Foundation

About

The Bob Marshall Wilderness Foundation (BMWF) provides access to and stewardship of Montana’s 1.6 million acre Bob Marshall Wilderness Complex. Our volunteer projects include opening trails, restoring native habitats, mitigating user impacts, and engaging youth and adults in wilderness experiences that change lives and instill a lasting land ethic.

Categories Program Adults BIPOC Community & Advocacy Educational / Vocational

Program Details

The Bob Marshall Wilderness Foundation's (BMWF) mission is active wilderness stewardship, where we connect people with America’s wilderness heritage by providing access to and stewardship of one of the world’s most spectacular places — Montana’s Bob Marshall Wilderness Complex. We help hundreds of hard-working volunteers of all ages to develop a land ethic and give back to the wilderness by opening trails, restoring heavily used areas, maintaining historic structures, and fighting weeds.

The BMWF’s education program creates place-based connections to wilderness through a variety of programs; we also work in close partnership with the US Forest Service to create educational and challenging conservation service projects within “the Bob”. Since our first summer in 1997, our volunteer crews have cleared and improved over 10,000 miles of trail.

As the definition of stewardship has changed over time, so has the Bob Marshall Wilderness Foundation. Since that first summer, BMWF has made strides in expanding our work beyond just “moving dirt”. We now have robust internship and apprenticeship programs that provide career pathways and pass down traditional wilderness skills to new generations. Additionally, we offer educational opportunities for students and new users to learn the value of the wilderness. We have diversified our stewardship opportunities and partnerships to help new communities experience the benefits of time spent in the Bob. Through these unique experiences in this special landscape, BMWF works to foster the next generation of conservation leaders, and all of our crews learn skills to become better backcountry users and take ownership of their public lands through active stewardship. Our hope is that they take their memories from the backcountry back home to become future wilderness advocates — to keep these wild places protected for generations to come.

Through intentional actions, we will seek connections with nature for all Montanans and Americans — connections that come from time spent on the lands we all share. We work to remove barriers for those who have not seen themselves as part of public lands, including Black, Indigenous, People of Color, and LGBTQ+ communities. BMWF explores our actions, examines our internal policies, and facilitates partnerships to help remove the vestiges of exclusion. As an organization, we have made a commitment to filling our community, board, and staff with new voices, wide-ranging ideas, and a wealth of different perspectives. We pledge to build meaningful relationships with not only our passionate volunteers, donors, and supporters, but also with individuals and organizations that do the incredible work of connecting a new and more diverse generation to wild nature.

Contact Erynn Castellanos, Education and Partnership Specialist erynn@bmwf.org (406) 329-3540 Bob Marshall Wilderness Foundation

Services Offered

Affinity program
Artist Wilderness Connection Program
Gear Library
Girls in the Bob
Great Bear Trail Posse
In-Classroom Wilderness Education
Internships
Packer Apprenticeships
Pack Workshops
Partner Programs
Wilderness 101
Wilderness Speaker Series

Cost to Participate
BMWF projects are free to everyone. We charge a small refundable deposit when you register to insure your commitment to the project; deposits can be refunded after completion of the project. If participants are unable to put down a deposit but still want to join, we are happy to waive the fee for special cases. We offer discounted security deposit rates for students and waive all deposits for Indigenous participants.

Staff Composition
Clifford Kipp - Executive Director
Rebecca Powell - Program Director
Allison Siems - Operations Director
Erynn Castellanos - Education and Partnership Specialist
Angela Wonders - Business Administrator
Zack Schlanger - Invasive Species Coordinator
Ian Bartling - Field Coordinator
Summer Interns (14)
Summer Crew Leader Positions (6)

A group of volunteers hike in a line along a thin trail as they make their way to their work site, where they will be doing trail work for the day. Thin trees cover the trail ahead of them, and in the distance are the silhouettes of vast mountains. The clear blue sky overhead promises a sunny day.

Two participants involved in the women's packing clinic learn how to pack a mule. Unfazed from the heavy loads that they are lifting onto the mule, they show off determined smiles to the camera. The loads themselves are half the sizes of the two women.

Three participants who are part of Girls in the Bob wear safety helmets as they inspect a fallen tree trunk. Around them are an abundance of more trees, some of which have also fallen. This tree observation is a feature in the Bob affinity space program, which is offered to girl-identifying teenagers interested in learning wilderness skills.

Two volunteers work to reestablish a disappearing trail in the wilderness. While wearing safety helmets, they pierce the dirt ground with handheld tools, which causes dust to stir around them. The surrounding scenery is a forest, with dense trees and undergrowth nearby the trail they are on.

On a clear, sunny day, a group of volunteers work to clear logs off a trail to make the path accessible. Two of the volunteers are providing direction on which trees to clear next, while the remainder of the group sit and listen attentively. Surrounding them is a sea of thin, barren trees, some of which have been already cleared.

Community science volunteers learn how to take critical water samples as part of their five days in the backcountry. Behind everyone is a thick sea of green undergrowth, lit up by rays of sunlight peeking through the trees. One of the hikers is instructing the others while he sits.

Volunteers carrying hiking gear on their backs pose in front of a wooden sign with bright smiles on their faces as part of Wilderness 101 – an education focused trip bringing BIPOC Wilderness visitors to the Bob to create a safe learning space within the community. Behind them are rows of bright green trees that travel far along into the horizon, with a bright blue and clear sky looming over the entire landscape.

Learn More About BMWF

Read: BMWF Fall Journal

Read: Bob Marshall Wilderness Complex Education Plan

International Journal of Wilderness
Read: Can We Make Wilderness More Welcoming?

Recent Case Studies

A child in a blue shirt and a child in a red shirt are playing the game Twister outdoors, on a surface of dried grass and leaves.

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