Tina Murray, Madison, Wis.

A teacher at Malcolm Shabazz City High School, Murray conceptualized a service-learning curriculum combining flyfishing, ecology, and conservation in 2005. She approached Trout Unlimited chapters and the Winsconsin DNR for help, pulling together 75 volunteers to metor the students of Project Green Teen, now entering its eighth year. "It's an amazing recipe of teachers and community partners," says Murray, who spends much of her own time working on the program. The teens integrate their classroom lessons with work to stabilize stream banks, remove invasive plants, and clean up rivers.

Roger Muggli, Miles City, Mont.

For 25 years, Muggli, an irrigation farmer and elected irrigation district manager, has dedicated his spare time to the construction of a 760-foot fish passageway on the Tongue River. The Muggli Fish Passage now allows more than 37,000 Yellowstone fish to bypass a dam built in 1886, and return to rich spawning habitat. "I couldn't just say, "This is the way it has been for so long.' Not if I wanted the problem fixed," says Muggli. He continues to monitor and amend the construction.

Bert Lindler, Missoula, Mont.

Lindler has spent the past seven years as a volunteer caretaker for the elk range on the outskirts of Missoula. He works to winden to widen it for the rapidly growing, and increasingly less migatory, herd of 470 elk. "I adopted the North Hiills elkherd - and all its problems," says Lindler. He collaborates with Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation members, state agencies, and local ranchers to control weeds that crowd out favored forage and to remove or rehab fencing for safe elk passage.