Did you know that you can create your own unique bird guide? Perhaps you are going to the Sweet Grass Hills and wonder what kinds of birds could be found there.
A bird list can be generated from the Montana Natural Heritage Program website via the “Species Snapshot” link. You can go to the site and generate a field guide for any number of landownership boundaries.
Here is a link to a 2016 guide specific to Cascade County.
You can also generate a list for a particular town, Important Bird Area, national park, national forest, watershed, and so on. You can use also build a field guide that includes other types of critters (mammals, reptiles, etc.)
It’s a pretty nifty tool that the Montana Heritage Program have developed! Kristina Smucker, nongame wildlife biologist for MT Fish, Wildlife & Parks in Great Falls provided the link so you can create your own list.
Here is the link if you’d like to play around with it:
http://mtnhp.org/SpeciesSnapshot/