ranchland

McRae is acutely aware that this wasn’t always ranchland — and that it probably won’t be forever.

Those are “call signs” for some of the 13 employees at the Clearwater wind farm, where 131 turbines are spread across 94 square miles of Montana ranchland a few hours north of Colstrip.

Gray skies loomed over huge scars of blackened earth in a rural area dotted with scrub brush, ranchland, rocky canyons and oil rigs.

“The other concern that we have is that area is highly erosive. There’s a lot of arroyos,” Eloy Vera, the county judge said, pointing out the creeks cutting through the ranchland and leading into the river.

Yet the nonprofit East Foundation, founded in 2007 to demonstrate that ranching and wildlife can coexist, owns 217,000 acres of ranchland in prime ocelot territory—and a significant amount of it is still a thorn scrub region.