FWP Hosting Greater Short-Horned Lizard Bioblitz Events in Billings

June 17, 2026
3:53 pm

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Montana’s decision to spotlight the greater short-horned lizard through a pair of free, public bioblitz events in Billings isn’t just about counting reptiles—it’s a vivid reminder that the same public lands where these lizards bask are the same places where Montanans exercise their Second Amendment rights every day. By inviting citizens to log sightings on iNaturalist during the Horned Lizard Conservation Society’s June 20-28 window, Fish, Wildlife & Parks is quietly reinforcing the principle that access to wild spaces depends on an engaged, responsible citizenry—one that already carries firearms for both recreation and protection while contributing to wildlife data. The optics are telling: agencies that once treated sportsmen as adversaries are now courting the same demographic to help gather the very information used to justify continued public-land access. For the 2A community the message is strategic. Every lizard observation uploaded by a concealed-carry permit holder or a hunter on his way to an elk unit is another data point proving that armed Americans are also the most consistent stewards of the landscape. That data, in turn, feeds the multi-species management plans that keep millions of acres open rather than locked behind “wilderness” designations that often curtail both hunting and defensive carry. In an era when anti-gun litigation increasingly targets public-land use, grassroots participation in events like the Billings bioblitz supplies agencies with the empirical ammunition they need to defend multiple-use policies—policies that explicitly include the right to bear arms. The larger implication is cultural as well as legal. When a state wildlife agency stages a lizard-counting weekend and hands out iNaturalist instructions instead of new restrictions, it signals that conservation and carry are not mutually exclusive. Montanans who show up with binoculars and sidearms are modeling the future of public-land policy: one where the Second Amendment is treated as an asset to wildlife management rather than an afterthought.

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For the 2A community the message is strategic. Every lizard observation uploaded by a concealed-carry permit holder or a hunter on his way to an elk unit is another data point proving that armed Americans are also the most consistent stewards of the landscape. That data, in turn, feeds the multi-species management plans that keep millions of acres open rather than locked behind “wilderness” designations that often curtail both hunting and defensive carry. In an era when anti-gun litigation increasingly targets public-land use, grassroots participation in events like the Billings bioblitz supplies agencies with the empirical ammunition they need to defend multiple-use policies—policies that explicitly include the right to bear arms.

The larger implication is cultural as well as legal. When a state wildlife agency stages a lizard-counting weekend and hands out iNaturalist instructions instead of new restrictions, it signals that conservation and carry are not mutually exclusive. Montanans who show up with binoculars and sidearms are modeling the future of public-land policy: one where the Second Amendment is treated as an asset to wildlife management rather than an afterthought.

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