Seeley Swan Pathfinder -

A bear’s nose knows when the smell of food wafts through the air. It’s integral to their survival, this tool for finding food, and is the reason why one resident of Montana’s Swan Valley has made it her summer’s work to pick up other people’s trash.

Kathy Koors has spent nearly 40 years living near Condon, Montana, in a pocket of the Treasure State defined largely by water and trees. Larch, lodgepole and Douglas fir mingle in dense stands around azure lakes squeezed between the Mission Mountains and Swan Range. It’s a place sprouting with new subdivisions and second homeowners,...