75th Celebration: Wilderness - Conserving Special Places

"A wilderness is hereby recognized as an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain" -Excerpt from the 1964 Wilderness Act. Fifty years ago, America became the first nation to make conservation of wilderness a national policy. For Idaho, this meant conserving the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness along the Idaho's northern Rocky Mountain spine. But the biggest swath of wilderness in the state, "The River of No Return Wilderness," was set aside in 1980 largely due to the efforts of Idaho Senator Frank Church and then Secretary of the Interior Cecil Andrus with essential help from Idaho Fish & Game's Marty Morache. "We had good and valid reason to strive for the protection of that and it was primarily driven by the anadromous fish values," said 87-year-old Morache. The Middle Fork of the Salmon River is crucial habitat for Idaho's Chinook salmon, steelhead and sockeye salmon. It also was home to bighorn sheep, elk, deer, bear, mountain lions, wolverines and more. Hand in hand with conserving Idaho's wildlife comes the responsibility of conserving the wild places where these animals make their home. To learn more about this and other 75th Celebration stories, go to http://fishandgame.idaho.gov/75th.