There was a time when Montana’s Northern Great Plains mirrored Africa’s Serengeti. Indigenous peoples led nomadic lives following herds of elk, bison, deer, and pronghorn. Nineteenth-century landscape artists and explorers documented the once-vast bison and elk herds that roamed the area, as well as grizzly bears, wolves, and other iconic wildlife. But today, temperate grasslands like those in Montana are one of the most threatened ecosystems in the world.
Short-grass prairies are the least protected biome of any global habitat. American Prairie is protecting a unique landscape—one of only four left in the world—where more than ninety percent of the habitat and native biodiversity is still present. There is still time to restore a fully-functioning ecosystem by assembling a seamless prairie habitat and bringing back wildlife population numbers, including species that have been lost due to human influence.
The Cameras for Conservation program aims to increase the tolerance for wildlife on private lands by providing direct payment to landowners for specific species captured by trail cameras on their properties. American Prairie staff work with landowners to deploy trail cameras on areas of their enrolled private property frequented by wildlife. Each species is assigned a value amount and one enrolled property stands to earn up to $6,000 a year of incentive payments based on the wildlife presence. Payments for species range from $25 for each image of a coyote to $500 for a wolf or grizzly bear. This program provides a way for landowners to receive “rent” for wildlife that utilize the habitat on their property with the goal that these species are viewed as economic assets. The Cameras for Conservation program serves as a great reminder that coexistence with wildlife is happening on a daily basis on private working lands!
As volunteers, your help identifying the wildlife you see in trail camera photos informs on-the-ground conservation work. Landowners hosting the trail cameras will receive payment for the species you identify, helping increase tolerance for wildlife in this area. The Cameras for Conservation program started in 2014, amassing hundreds of thousands of photos. These photos first go through a filtering process in the Wildlife Insights platform to eliminate blanks (no animals present) and photos with humans in them. Next, American Prairie will upload photos collected in the previous calendar year for identification on Zooniverse. Once completed, we will share figures and analysis of species diversity and abundance for our Great Plains region under the "Results" tab. After 2024 photos are analyzed, we will release 2023 images and continue the process. Your help as volunteers is essential, we cannot thank you enough for the valuable time and energy you spend helping us protect wildlife.
To generate a volunteer certificate confirming your service hours, you must have a Zooniverse.org account.
Go to zooniverse.org, sign in, and click ‘More Stats’. Use the drop-down options on the upper-right of the stats bar chart to filter to a specific time period and/or project of interest. Then click on ‘Generate Volunteer Certificate’ (the button to the bottom-right of your stats bar chart).
