On November 9, from 7:00 – 9:00 (with an opening reception at 6:30 pm), at The Bug Theatre in Denver, CO, Rocky Mountain Wild will be having their The Wild & Scenic Film Festival On Tour Event. The evening will include award-winning environmental films, which have been selected not only for their great visual stories but also to inspire and motivate us to become or remain in right relationship with each other and the planet. They will be also hosting an in-person raffle, a Community Action Hub, and an online auction as part of the event.
Rocky Mountain Wild is a 501(c)3 created by the merger of two of Colorado’s most trusted and effective conservation organizations, Center for Native Ecosystems and Colorado Wild. Recognizing the need to stem dramatic losses of native species and habitat, these organizations joined forces to protect, connect and restore wildlife and wild lands of our region.
Rocky Mountain Wild has a long and rich history. Each of their predecessor organizations, along with the Southern Rockies Ecosystem Project (which joined Center for Native Ecosystems in 2008), enjoyed more than a dozen years of successful conservation advocacy. Their staff shares 108 years of conservation experience and has protected over 2 million acres of wildlife habitat.
Today, Rocky Mountain Wild protects wild lands for wildlife throughout the Southern Rocky Mountain region of Colorado, southern Wyoming, eastern Utah, and northern New Mexico. In order to secure a biologically healthy future for the wildlife and people of our Rocky Mountain home, they:
Rocky Mountain Wild works to protect, connect, and restore wildlife and wild lands in the Southern Rocky Mountain region. They envision a biologically healthy future for our region – one that includes a diversity of species and ecosystems, thriving populations of wildlife, and a sustainable coexistence between people and nature. Using research, community science, legal action, and advanced geospatial analysis, they offer solutions for conserving their most at-risk animal and plant species and landscapes. They are actively building a diverse community of educators, students, activists, philanthropists, and community scientists to help them make their vision a reality.
Their Room to Roam program addresses habitat fragmentation by identifying and protecting key remaining habitats and restoring the linkages between them. On the national scale, Rocky Mountain Wild works to protect the Southern Rockies as part of the greater Western Wildway. On a more local level Rocky Mountain Wild works to identify, protect, and restore the most important wildlife movement corridors in Colorado. From the high-altitude wildlife linkage at Wolf Creek Pass to the wildlife movement pathways that are severed by traffic along the I-70 Mountain Corridor, they work to provide science-based solutions that provide wildlife with room to roam.
Rocky Mountain Wild also works with a coalition of organizations across the Rocky Mountain West that monitors oil and gas leasing in those states. Oil and gas development compromises public lands and waters, changes and fragments wildlife habitats, threatens irreplaceable cultural resources and sacred sites, and risks human health and outdoor legacy. Rocky Mountain Wild works to stop leasing that would harm wildlife and wild lands and have been directly involved in the deferral of over 2 million acres of public land from oil and gas development.
Through their Key Species program, Rocky Mountain Wild is actively engaged in safeguarding more than two dozen plant and animal species, including the greater sage-grouse, boreal toad, American Pika, and Graham’s penstemon.
They also engage community science projects to do important research that informs their conservation work. Volunteers partner with scientists to answer real-world questions about the problems facing wildlife and biodiversity in their region.
Rocky Mountain Wild has hosted a Wild & Scenic Film Festival On Tour Event since at least 2010. Chris Talbot-Heindl, Rocky Mountain Wild’s Communications Director, says, “This event helps us demonstrate important environmental causes that might be heavy or hard to explain in simple media snippets, and expands on them, bringing the story to life on the big screen. It helps us bring awareness to a wider audience and provide factual and accurate information to folks who have been with us from the beginning.”
Chris goes on to say, “The Wild & Scenic Film Festival is my favorite event of the year because it weaves together art and activism, my two big passions. Because the Wild & Scenic Film Festival is more than simply a festival of films, everyone gets inspired, motivated, and re-invigorated to make a difference in our local ecosystems as well as the whole planet. What’s not to love?”
