Kurt began his journey of activ-ism fairly recently, but in a short amount of time he has made his presence known and in fact if you asked most people they would tell you that he must be an old pro from the “good old days”. In fact Kurt got the bug during the recent Lincoln County campaign, and thanks to the early tutelage of Carrie Sandstedt, he is now a man on a mission to protect the remain-ing, unprotected wilderness land in Nevada.

When asked what made him take the leap from a guy who loved to climb (his big one early on was 13,900’ Mt. Humphreys in the Sierra in the 1970s) and backpack, to a guy who gets letters signed, takes visitors out to wild places, and puts on a suit to visit Washington DC and talk to politicians, he said it comes down to knowing what is in your heart. Right versus wrong. No need to be a library

personal contact that allowed him to see what is possible and be given the chance to participate. Thankfully for NWP and the wild areas of Nevada, Kurt found us.

So where is his favorite place in Nevada? Maybe surprisingly it is Burbank Canyon WSA in Douglas County. It is small, but it packs a wallop according to Kurt. It is also the only BLM WSA in Nevada, where you could run into all of the big Nevada carnivores-bobcat, coyote, mountain lion, golden ea-gle and black bear!

Where does he want to go next? His list would require a rather long spreadsheet, but the top two settle somewhere between the glacier of Nevada’s only national park near Ely, or the Park Range WSA, which is one wild place far off the beaten path in the wild between Duckwater and Moores Station.

Finally, Kurt’s most memorable experience so far as a Nevada wilderness activist was the trip

of information about wilderness, the laws, the Congress, or other minutia, but listen to the thing that gets you to 13,000’ or on top of a granite bulb in Lava Beds.

The simplicity of his transforma-tion should not be lost on any of us. We love these places, not out of some analytical sense of num-bers or some matrix of values, but because it resonates with us at our core. For Kurt, the only thing that was missing was that

back to Washington DC that was sponsored by NWP in the fall of 2004. He was joined in the trip by Nancy Hall, Bill Hug-gins, and Kim Jardine. Accord-ing to Kurt, “It truly was one of the best experiences of my life…Democracy in action.”

Thank you Kurt. Thanks for taking the time to get involved and for inspiring others with your actions and the simplicity of your message-”All you need to do is to take the first step, the rest is the easy part.”

Rocks Wilderness. With these protec-tions, Congress has once again high-lighted that BLM wilderness recommenda-tions are seriously flawed. These areas also stand as permanent testimony to the power of folks like you. When you organ-ize, educate, and agitate, the result is per-manent protection for these special places in our wild heritage.

This legislation also contains some difficult development provisions which remain

In December, President Bush signed the Lincoln County Conservation, Recrea-tion, and Development Act of 2004. De-spite the name, this was in fact a biparti-san development bill with a significant wilderness component.

Thanks to your hard work and dedication, the wilderness title of this legislation pro-tects 768,294 acres of legal wilderness as part of the National Wilderness Preservation System! Although this amount of wilderness is less than one third of what the Nevada Wilderness Coa-lition proposed, the areas protected do represent the largest single designation in Nevada's history.

Of particular note to Nevadans who have worked so hard to protect wilderness in Nevada are two areas the BLM ignored in its intensive wilderness review in the 1980s: the 28,000+ acre Mt. Irish Range Wilderness and the 13,000 acre Big

troublesome to the Nevada Wilder-ness Coalition and the entire Nevada environmental community . We re-mained opposed to any interbasin water transfer that is scientifically and ecologically unsound.

Stay tuned for news about what’s next for wilderness in Nevada. We’ll certainly continue to engage our bi-partisan Congressional delegation, and we’ll work hard to ensure that wilderness protections are a part of any public lands discussion. And in the meantime, know that without your time, effort, and money, we could not have achieved this remarkable con-servation victory!

— John Wallin, Di-rector

VIVA LAS WILDERNESS !

Winter 2005

Wilderness Hero : Kurt Kuznicki

Headline News 1 Wilderness Hero 1 FUNdraising 2 — 3 Business Highlight 3 Lincoln Co. Map 4 Wilderness Spotlight 5 WILD Calendar 6

Kurt challenging the monster burger!

Moapa Peak in the Mormon Mountain Wilderness

Wilderness Protected in Lincoln County

Once again, NWP’s fabulous board members pulled through with three hugely successful end-of-the-year fundraising ef-forts. With two house parties in November - one in Reno and another in Las Vegas, a day-long fundraiser at Patagonia headquarters in Ventura, CA, and corporate matching funds from Pepsi Co. and Patagonia Inc., our fundraising efforts for 2004 ended with a bang.

Hosting her second annual house party, board member Kim Jardine again served up some great food, a home grown slide-show by her partner, Marcial, and a fun evening with fellow Reno Service Center Patagonia employees on November 11, 2004. John Wallin, the Project’s director, was on hand to give a Wilderness update as well as mingle with many of our existing Patagonia members and help Kim and Marcial recruit a few new ones. As usual, Kim’s enthusiasm and great host-ess abilities turned the evening into another success for Ne-vada Wilderness support.

Thanks to board mem-ber Tori King, an ac-count manager for Pepsi Bottling Com-pany in Las Vegas, one of her enthusiastic

co-workers and fellow account manager, Mark Walters and his wife Jennifer, generously hosted a Project house party fund-raiser on November 20, 2004. With food and beverages either donated or provided at a reduced cost by local Las Vegas businesses having a great relationship with Pepsi (Jersey Mike’s Subs and convenience stores, Rebel Oil and Shortline Express), the nearly 50 people attending, most of whom were Pepsi employees themselves, were some of the first folks to help us celebrate the new Lincoln County Wilderness after the bill passed on November 17. Party-goers enjoyed libations, good conversation, a Nevada Wilderness slideshow and some Vegas-style card playing! Nearly everyone attending became a member of the Project and with the Pepsi corporate match for each employee donation to the Project, we surpassed our fundraising goal for the event!

Finally, in celebration of the Project’s huge accomplishment in Lincoln County, board members Morlee Griswold and Chris Todd and former NWP fieldworker and fabulous volunteer,

Page 2

HOUSE PARTY FUNDRAISING SUCCESS ! Adam Chamberlain helped organize and pull off the hugely successful 2nd-annual NWP FUNdraiser at Patagonia Inc. headquarters in Ventura, California on December 9. The day kicked off with a Pancake Mountain Breakfast with flapjacks, eggs and bacon served up by some of Patagonia's finest vol-unteers. Erika Pollard, from the Project, shared a Brown Bag lunchtime presentation showcasing Nevada Wilderness suc-cesses. And the day was wrapped up with a Mormon Moun-tain Margarita and Smoothie party.

There was also a silent auction ongoing throughout the day with a great selection of items, including a backcountry moun-tain bike adventure trip from Escape Adventures in Las Vegas, rock climbing instruction from Sky’s the Limit guide service in Las Vegas, a surfing class with Surfclass.com in Ventura, sev-eral Kelty backpacks and Margaret Stangeland's famous soaps. All told, the day was a huge success with nearly 100 Patagonia employees donating to the Project with doubly gen-erous matching gifts from both the Senior Management Team and the Patagonia Company.

A huge thank you to all those who organized and participated in our end of the year FUNdraising festivities with special thanks to Kim Jardine, Marcial Riley, Tori King, Mark and Jen-nifer Walters, Morlee Griswold, Chris Todd, Adam Chamber-lain, Pepsi Bottling Group, Yvon and Malinda Chouinard, Mi-chael Crook, and the entire Patagonia community. Your sup-port of the Nevada Wilderness Project through the donation of your time, your hard-earned dollars, gifts-in-kind and/or ser-vices helped make each event a great success. Thank you also to each and every person who attended the festivities and chose to become a member of Nevada Wilderness Project. We continue to be inspired by the enthusiasm of our board and each and every fabulous Wilderness member we acquired throughout the year.

- Erika Pollard, National Outreach Director

Amy Stanfield, Sierra Alder and Kate Miller and Manny Molina at the stove at Ventura Event. Photo © Adam Chamberlain

Board Member Tori King, Jennifer, Mark and Nick Walters at the Las Vegas House Party. Photo © Erika Pollard

House Parties in Reno, Vegas and Ventura.

Viva Las Wilderness ! Winter 2005 — www.wildnevada.org

FUNDRAISING UPDATE: Your Support Goes a Long Way!

Page 3 Viva Las Wilderness !

BUSINESS SPOTLIGHT

Who would have thought that just 5 short years since the founding of the Nevada Wilderness Project, we have protected almost 2 million acres of wild lands in Nevada as permanent Wilderness. We have been fortunate that many factors have fallen into place and contributed to these successes. However, no factor has been more important than the work and support that we have received from our very own members and volunteers. YOU have made this happen! Generations to come will be able to enjoy the precious oppor-tunity deserved by every human being to experience the beauty of unspoiled lands because of your efforts and generous support. We have protected these spectacular, rugged-and imperiled lands as permanent Wilderness – in perpetuity. As the fastest growing state in the nation, this is no small success.

Furthermore, we’ve only just begun! There are still many more acres of imperiled pristine wild lands in the state that deserve protection and we are already beginning to prepare ourselves for another campaign. As

the successes of the past, our future campaigns will need your support in order to suc-ceed. Please consider making a donation today and asking your friends and family to become members as well.

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Join the Nevada Wilderness Project’s monthly giving group, The Wild Legacy Club, to provide critical support for the protection of Nevada’s wild heritage for the enjoy-ment of generations to come. Learn more and sign up at www.wildnevada.org — Anna Ball, Development Director

Want this Fabulous t-shirt? With a $25 donation it’s yours! Join on-line or use the form on the back page.

With our roots in the cutting edge, environmentally savvy out-door clothing company Patagonia, the Nevada Wilderness Project understands the power—both human and financial—that businesses can bring to bear on wilderness protection efforts. One obvious sector we’ve focused on is the outdoor industry—in particular, companies whose customers depend on vast wild country for their human-powered recreation. One such company is Seattle-based Montrail, a manufacturer of high quality footwear for trail running, adventure racing, walking, hiking, backpacking, rock climbing, and mountain-eering.

Montrail got involved with the Nevada Wilderness Project through the company’s membership in the Conservation Alli-ance, a non-profit organization of outdoor businesses whose collective annual membership dues support grassroots citi-zen-action groups and their efforts to protect wild and natural areas. The Project has received two grants from the Conser-vation Alliance for work in Eastern and Southern Nevada,

www.montrail.com

indispensable support that helped protect over a million acres of wilderness in.

Menno Van Wyk, Montrail’s founding CEO, dropped by the Project offices a couple of years ago to learn more about our work. We spent an afternoon with Menno, showing him the potential of Nevada wilderness and our larger conservation vision. He came away impressed with our grassroots focus and our bottom line success.

“Our customers require wild places to use our products,” Menno said. “We recognize that protecting wilderness is good business. We support the Nevada Wilderness Project because their work—based as it is in the nuts and bolts work of grassroots organizing—is obviously successful. We’re delighted to be partners with the Project because they are

leading the way nationally in designating new wilder-ness areas.”

Montrail’s mission to pro-tect wilderness doesn’t

stop at the Nevada border—in fact, Menno was recently elected President of the Conservation Alliance. “We’re going to try to increase support for groups like the Nevada Wilder-ness Project because that is the best way to ensure that our customers can continue to enjoy our products,” he said.

We’re grateful to Montrail and Menno Van Wyk for their sup-port of the Project, and for their role in the Conservation Alli-ance. This support has been instrumental in our success, and we look forward to continuing our successful partnership in the future.

“Our customers require wild places to use our products,” Menno said. “We recognize that protecting wilderness is good business.”

Winter 2005 — www.wildnevada.org

768,294 Acres of New Wilderness in Lincoln County!

Page 4 Viva Las Wilderness ! Winter 2005 — www.wildnevada.org

Page 5 Viva Las Wilderness !

Wilderness Area Spotlight: Schellback Area Shellback Proposed Wilderness—White Pine County The Shellback area, just south of Highway 50 and adjacent to the Illipah Reservoir Recreation Area is in a beautiful part of Nevada west of Ely. The area is managed by the USFS. This Forest Service Roadless area could also be called Moorman Ridge, as it makes up the central spine of this 38,540 acre proposal area. Marked by several springs on the “wet” west side of the ridge, this area is home to some great hiking and hunting opportunities. There are three very short cherrystems that provide vehicle access on the north and southeast.

Aspen can be found at the spring sites and elk, bighorn sheep, and mule deer can be seen. Birding is great as well, with all the common Nevada species, along with some of the less common birds of the Great Basin in Nevada, including Ferruginous Hawk and Greater Sage Grouse if you are lucky. Elevations range from 7,000’ to 8,500’, with a pinyon- juniper eco-system on the west side, with a sagebrush ecosystem on the eastside.

While the area is an identified roadless area by the Forest Service, there is the potential for oil and gas development in the area. The Shellback Pro-posed Wilderness is in a unique area of White Pine County in the White Pine Range that receives relatively little recreational use. Access: Just south of Hwy 50 at Illipah, there is a graded road the forms part of the west-ern boundary. Hikers can start on the south-east near Limestone

Peak and Hayden Canyon or on the west near the Aspen Spring area. Remember not to camp directly on springs. The turn off for the Illipah Recreation area, which sits at the northwestern corner of the unit, is about 25 miles west of Ely. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Nevada Atlas & Gazatteer: p. 48 D1-2; E1-2; F1-2 USGS 7.5 Topo Maps: Hamilton; Illipah; Treasure Hill; Limestone Peak; Indian Garden Mountain; Willow Grove.

Photo © John Wallin

Photo © John Wallin

Photo © John Wallin

Winter 2005 — www.wildnevada.org

HELP US PROTECT YOUR WILDERNESS

Join NWP staff and volunteers on trips to potential wilderness areas! You can see beautiful places and help protect them at the same time by writing letters and plugging in to our efforts in a way that’s interesting and fun. All outings are weather permitting. Please log on to www.wildnevada.org for more information.

NEVADA WILDERNESS CALENDAR — WILDERNESS VALUE TRIPS

It’s easy to help… Cut out this form and mail it to: NV Wilderness Project, 8550 White Fir St; Reno, NV 89523

Enclosed is my donation of: I would like to make a recurring donation:

Monthly

Every 3 months

Annually

$25.00

$50.00

$100.00

$250.00

$500.00

Other Amount: ____________

Comments:

Name Phone Number

Address

Email address

City State Zip

Please include check or money order payable to Nevada Wilderness Project.

For secure credit card transactions, please visit

http://www.wildnevada.org

Northern Nevada February 20 - Big Den Creek Snowshoe - Desatoya Mountains Wilderness Study Area Difficulty: Moderate (Group limit 8)

March 12 - Mt. Limbo Hike, Selenite Mountains - Mt. Limbo Wilderness Study Area in Pershing Co. Difficulty: Strenuous (Group limit 8)

April 2-3 - Burbank Canyons Backpack - Canyons Wil-derness Study Area. (Group limit 8)

April 16-17 - Lava Beds Car Camp and Hike - Pershing County Difficulty: Moderate (Group limit 12)

April 30-May 1 - Shellback Proposed Wilderness - White Pine Range in White Pine County Difficulty Moderate/Strenuous (Group limit 8)

May 21 - Smoke Creek Desert Day Hike Difficulty: Moderate (Group limit 10)

June 4th - Fox Range Wilderness Study Area Difficulty: Moderate (Group limit 10)

June 11-12 - Highland Ridge Proposed Wilderness – White Pine County Difficulty:Moderate (Group limit 10)

Southern Nevada February 26-27 - Gold Butte Car Camp – Clark County Difficulty: Moderate (Group limit 10)

March 19 - Highland Range Day hike – Clark County Difficulty: Moderate to Strenuous (Group limit 8)

April 21 Not-so-full-moon hike in First Creek East – Clark County Difficulty: Moderate (Group limit 15)

May 7-8 Pahranagat Range Car Camp – Lincoln County Difficulty: Moderate/Strenuous (Group limit 10)

Photo © Kristie Connolly