Friends helping clear the Breaks

Jim Brenna, a volunteer from Havre, assesses a blooming salt cedar shrub before removing it with a pulaski. Brenna was part of a group of volunteers put together by the Friends of the Missouri Breaks Monument to remove the infestation upstream of Fort Peck. The infestation began largely in the 2011 floods and is still small enough to remove with hand tools. The infestation has largely taken over parts of southwestern U.S. and is being seen more in the Missouri, Musselshell and Yellowstone regions. The plant is bad for stockgrowers and recreationists alike.