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WEL C O M E T O THE BITTERR O O T V ALLEY
Less than a generation ago, agriculture was a primary revenue source for many in the Bitterroot Valley. Neighbors worked together branding calves, picking apples and putting up bales of hay. The community was built around a lifestyle that started at sunrise and ended at sunset most days of the year. There were fewer people, fewer cars, and more open land than you see around you today. Living in the Bitterroot still offers the possibility of a small town USA lifestyle, but our community is now much different. The apple orchards of old are now commonly referred to as orchard tracts (10 acre lots). At night from a mountain ridge top, you see more yard lights in the Valley than you did just ten short years ago. Some of the vehicle traffic at certain times of the day is downright busy (although perhaps not by the standards of some cities). All that said, residents and tourists alike stay or come here for the rich history, open lands, fish, wildlife and scenic beauty that our valley still offers. The rural lifestyle, the sight of cattle grazing in a green pasture, the smell of fresh cut hay, and the pace is appealing to all of us who live here. The publication that you hold before you is intended to serve as your guide to living in this rural agriculturally based environment. If you have never lived in the country it should come as no surprise that we may see things a bit differently than you are accustomed to. For example, if you live near a local dairy farm, the rich aroma coming from the dairy farm smells like money – not cow manure. The tractor or hay wagon driving down the Eastside Highway and slowing traffic to a crawl is how we measure time and seasons. People who you pass on the road will wave for no other reason than to offer a friendly greeting. We don’t expect all the roads to be paved, and the dust usually washes off in the rain. It was our goal in assembling this publication to provide you