Colorado Wildlands Project

08/28/2024

With summer on its way out, fall and winter will change our local public lands! Leaves will fall, snow will paint the landscape and ecosystems will transition. This is the perfect time to explore these lands with a new perspective! What ways do you want to recreate outside this season? 

PC: .mullen

06/19/2024

We acknowledge Indigenous peoples as the original and longest serving stewards of all land in North America. Conversations around public lands in western Colorado could not exist without input and education from Indigenous voices.

As development continues to expand in landscapes across Colorado, we must consider the Indigenous history on these lands as well as the impacts of land ownership and development on Indigenous communities.

Check out the link in our bio to learn more.

Photo Credit: Hugh Carey, The Colorado Sun

05/17/2024

Come celebrate Colorado Public Lands Day with us this Saturday 5/18 at the Grand Valley River Fest at Las Colonias Park in Grand Junction! Look for the Colorado Wildlands Project booth. We will have lots of free swag and opportunities to support our work on local public lands. Hope to see you there!

04/26/2024

REMINDER!!

If you love the Dolores River and its incredible canyon country then join us in Grand Junction on Saturday, April 27th!

Senator Hickenlooper is hosting a public comment listening session on the proposal to protect the Dolores Canyons as a national monument.

📆 When: Saturday, April 27th @ 10:00am
📍 Where: Robinson Theatre, Colorado Mesa University

We are counting on you to help advocate for this very special place.

Please register for this in the 🔗 in our bio today.

04/22/2024

📢 IMPORTANT UPDATE!

Join us for an important listening session with Senator Hickenlooper to discuss the future of the Dolores Canyons and the proposed national monument.

📆 When: Saturday, April 27th @ 10:00am
📍 Where: Robinson Theatre, Colorado Mesa University

We’re counting on you to help advocate for this incredible place, so please register for these events at the 🔗 in our bio today!

04/18/2024

🎉 BIG news for BLM lands 🎉 After 40 years of prioritizing extractive industries, the Bureau of Land Management () is putting cultural lands protection, conservation, access to nature, wildlife, and climate change mitigation on equal footing with development to uphold its multiple-use mission.

CWP is eager to support the agency in implementing this long overdue measure to ensure wildlands across Colorado are managed for protection of their special values for generations to come. Thank you and for listening to local communities and leaders across the West and raising the floor for how public lands are managed!

04/04/2024

Why as a national monument? “Since 1990, Colorado has grown by over 2.5 million residents. In the face of that growth, our protected public lands help preserve our Colorado way of life and provide us with clean drinking water, fresh air, healthy and huntable wildlife populations, and countless opportunities to get outside…
Public lands across Colorado, including the Dolores, are already experiencing steadily increasing visitation and the attendant impacts. A national monument is an opportunity to stay a step ahead of the crowds. It can focus our management attention on this incredible place, can help us leverage new resources to develop sustainable recreation infrastructure, and can help us ensure that any increased use contributes to the sustainability of local economies while minimizing damage to the very resources that attract people to these public lands in the first place.”
Read more from our own Scott Braden at the link in our bio.

04/03/2024

Big news!! Earlier today, the Department of the Interior announced the finalization of the Thompson Divide Administrative Mineral Withdrawal, which will protect 225,000 acres of public lands in western Colorado from future oil and gas leasing and mining for the next 20 years.

The withdrawal is the result of a decade and a half of strong community collaboration — local ranchers, mountain bikers, conservationists and businesses are celebrating this historic win for local public lands. The Thompson Divide stretches south from Glenwood Springs through the Sunlight Ski Resort, across McClure and Kebler passes, and all the way to Crested Butte, including Mt. Emmons.



Photo: Jon Mullen / Ecostock

03/31/2024

Happy Easter to all the peeps out there!

03/29/2024

BLM is undergoing a necessary process to move forward previous planning efforts in western Colorado. The rule is focused on defining allowable uses in special management areas and formalizing  certain management actions  necessary to protect visitor health and safety, as well as wildlife, natural, and cultural resources. We are pleased to finally see the implementation of  longstanding land management plans in western Colorado. To review and comment on the proposed rule, please visit the link in our bio.

03/21/2024

We agree Conservation Colorado!

There are so many good reasons why the Dolores River should be designated as a national monument, from protecting our wildlife from pollution to supporting local outdoor recreation economies. Thank you Jen Clanahan, co-director of Mountain Mamas, for writing about another important reason: ensuring future generations have access to the outdoors.

"Establishing a national monument for the Dolores Canyons region is not merely about conserving ecological values but a moral imperative. By protecting these lands, we are guaranteeing the natural heritage of future generations and nurturing the bond between children and nature," Clanahan wrote in an op-ed published last week in the The Colorado Sun, which can be read in full here: bit.ly/493MfXy

To ensure future generations have access to the natural beauty of the Dolores River and surrounding canyon country, we need to . Sign the petition to add your name to the movment today: protectthedolores.org/take-action

03/15/2024

“[T]he entire “locked out” argument completely misconstrues the intent of the Wilderness Act, which was to preserve areas where “the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain.” In other words, a wilderness is an area where our own recreational convenience is considered secondary to the welfare of the habitat and the wildlife. Again, a concept in which we should take exceptional pride.”

Read this excellent defense of wilderness and protected roadless areas from author, adventurer, off-road enthusiast and co-founder of Overland Journal Jonathan Hanson

Jonathan Hanson March 4, 2024 Anti Access? Or just Pro Habitat? Jonathan Hanson March 4, 2024 This photo appeared several years ago in a full-page spread in the New York Times and other newspapers. In the February/March issue of OVR magazine—a fine publication to which I contribute regularly—my ...