Montana ranks seventh in the nation for the number of Olympic athletes by birthplace on a per-capita basis since 1924, placing the state behind Alaska and New Hampshire and ahead of New York and Rhode Island.

A total of 58 Montana-born athletes have competed in summer and winter Olympic Games since the first Winter Olympics was held in 1924, according to an analysis by Montana Free Press using data from Olympedia. Adjusted for population, that amounts to 5.8 Olympians per 100,000 residents — a rate higher than 43 other states and 89% higher than the national average of 3.0.

Montana trails only Vermont, Massachusetts, Hawaii, Minnesota, Alaska and New Hampshire in per-capita Olympic production since 1924. Vermont leads the nation at around 10 Olympians per 100,000 residents while Massachusetts and Hawaii narrowly exceed seven per 100,000.

California has produced more than 1,700 Olympians over the same period, the most of any state, but ranks 10th per capita at 4.5 per 100,000 residents due to its population being nearly 38 times larger than Montana as of the 2020 census.

Montana’s total includes a fairly even ratio of athletes who competed in the Summer and Winter Games. Of the state’s Olympians, 55% have been competitors in the winter Olympics with the remaining 45% participating in the Summer Olympic Games. 

That’s a contrast to Vermont, where nearly 85% of Olympians on record competed in the Winter games, and Hawaii, where 98% of Olympians have competed in Summer games.

New York and Rhode Island round out the states immediately behind Montana. The bottom of the ranking is populated by several large states, including Texas, Florida and North Carolina, which rank low on a per-capita basis despite sending dozens or even hundreds of athletes to the games.

Montana ranks 37th in its total number of Olympians since 1923.

Montana athletes have competed in sports including basketball, boxing, shooting, distance running, swimming, hockey, rowing, discus, shotput, wrestling, luge and a variety of skiing events. They include Konnor Ralph, who learned to ski at Great Divide Ski Area outside of Helena and competed in the Men’s Slopestyle and Big Air competitions in this year’s Olympic Games as well as Jake Sanderson who was part of the Men’s Hockey team’s that upset the Canadian team to bring home the gold for Team USA this year. The 2026 Winter Olympics ended on Feb. 22.

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Montana attorney general Austin Knudsen announced last week that he is investigating the city of Helena after local officials approved a resolution in late January directing police to avoid assisting federal immigration enforcement, a hallmark of so-called sanctuary-city policies that restrict local law enforcement cooperation with federal immigration officials. 

Knudsen’s announcement tees up potential legal clashes between state and municipal governments over immigration policies, and could influence whether other localities in Montana adopt similar policies. It also raises questions about what local immigration enforcement policies across the state currently are. 

A report from the Migration Policy Institute estimated that in 2023, the latest year for which estimates are available, Montana was home to about 6,000 unauthorized residents, representing the lowest per capita population of undocumented immigrants of any state.

According to a 2009 Congressional Research Service report, historical authority for state and local law enforcement to enforce immigration law has been limited to certain criminal provisions in the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. That changed when Congress passed the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, which substantially modified U.S. immigration law, including establishment of the 287(g) program, which allows for voluntary partnerships with federal immigration authorities that let local officers perform certain federal functions.

After President Donald Trump took office in 2025, his administration began aggressively expanding the number of 287(g) agreements with local police departments. Congress allocated $75 billion to Immigration and Customs Enforcement over four years through the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” tripling ICE funding over the prior fiscal year and giving it the largest budget of any federal law enforcement agency. 

Montana Free Press reached out to law enforcement and elected officials across the state to learn about their policies. We found that each jurisdiction handles immigration enforcement a bit differently, but all agreed that the roles played by local law enforcement are limited. Only Helena has a city resolution specifying local law enforcement’s role in enforcing immigration law. 

Helena: Resolved that police will work with ICE only under a court order 

Republican Attorney General Knudsen said his office is reviewing whether Helena’s Jan. 26 resolution violates House Bill 200, a law signed by Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte that prohibits state and local governments from adopting policies that restrict cooperation with federal immigration authorities. The law requires local governments to share immigration-status information with federal agents and to comply with lawful requests from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, including certain detention requests.

Knudsen said Helena’s policy appears to conflict with the state law, and warned the city could face financial penalties of $10,000 for every five days of noncompliance, in addition to the potential loss of state grant funding. As of Feb. 18, Knudsen has not yet filed a civil action against the city alleging noncompliance.

Helena’s resolution — a formal statement of city policy directing how municipal resources may be used — states that city police will avoid committing resources to federal immigration enforcement and will not enter into a 287(g) agreement. The policy also prohibits the city from disclosing a resident’s place of birth, immigration status or national origin unless required by law or court order.

In a Feb. 11 statement, city officials said the resolution was legally vetted prior to approval and complies with applicable state and federal law. City representatives declined to comment further, citing the pending investigation. 

In January, Helena Police Chief Brett Petty withdrew from the Missouri River Drug Task Force over the task force’s cooperation with U.S. Customs and Border Protection, telling Helena city commissioners, “ I decided to, for Helena PD, to temporarily withdraw from MRDTF because I want to make sure and keep our focus here for Helena PD [on] the policing and the drug activity.” East Helena, a separate municipality, said it will continue to be part of the MRDTF, which also includes law enforcement from Lewis and Clark, Gallatin, Park, Meagher, Madison, Broadwater, and Sweet Grass counties. The East Helena Police Department has not responded to MTFP’s request for additional comment.

Great Falls: Local law enforcement doesn’t have jurisdiction on immigration 

In Great Falls, citizens have recently urged the City Commission to act in response to ICE activity, with some public commenters calling for a resolution to bar local law enforcement from cooperating with the federal agency, as Helena’s resolution does. In a phone interview with MTFP, Mayor Cory Reeves said the city has no plans to consider such a resolution. In an email shared with MTFP, the Great Falls Police Department referred to Montana Code 2-1-601 through 605, the 2021 statute that prohibits restricting municipal cooperation with federal immigration authorities for “lawful purposes.” 

Cascade County, which contains Great Falls, was listed in 2025 as having a “pending” 287(g) agreement with ICE, but does not appear on ICE’s public list of 287(g) partners. The 287(g) agreement allows local officials to conduct immigration enforcement action, as long as local law enforcement officers “receive appropriate training and function under the supervision of ICE.” 

In a phone interview with MTFP, Cascade County Sheriff Jesse Slaughter said that, regarding immigration law, local law enforcement personnel don’t “have jurisdiction, our role is rather limited.” Slaughter said the sheriff’s office works with federal immigration authorities only when addressing criminal matters within the county’s authority. 

Missoula: Local police don’t enforce federal immigration law 

Missoula Mayor Andrea Davis and Police Chief Michael Colyer recently posted an online explanation of the city’s policies, stating that local officers do not ask about immigration status during routine public interactions and do not enforce federal immigration law. City Council member Kristen Jordan said in an interview with MTFP last week that she is drafting a resolution she believes would affirm local independence from federal immigration enforcement and codify existing police practices, including a provision that the city will not enter into a 287(g) agreement allowing local police to enforce federal immigration law, and plans to submit it this week. Jordan said she believes Helena’s resolution “doesn’t violate HB 200” and described Knudsen’s investigation as “yet another attempt to take away local control.” 

Bozeman: Immigration enforcement is not a local police duty

Bozeman police chief Jim Veltkamp told MTFP in a phone interview last week that his department’s focus is on public safety and investigating crimes, and that immigration enforcement is not “something that falls within our duties, at all.” Veltkamp also noted that the city of Bozeman does not have a 287(g) agreement with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. According to ICE’s list of 287(g) participants, Gallatin County does participate in a 287(g) under the “Warrant Service Officer” model, a limited cooperation agreement that allows specially trained local officers to serve ICE administrative warrants for people already in local custody, but not carry out broader immigration enforcement in the community. 

Local limits, federal responsibility

While officials in Billings, Butte-Silver Bow and Kalispell have not responded to MTFP requests for comment, ICE’s public list of 287(g) agreements indicates they do not participate in the 287(g) program. That list shows that the sheriff’s office in Flathead County, which includes Kalispell, does participate in the program under the “Warrant Service Officer” model. Yellowstone County, which contains Billings, has no agreement with ICE at all. 

Matt Hudson, JoVonne Wagner, and Katie Fairbanks contributed reporting.

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Montanan Konnor Ralph is set to compete on one of the biggest stages in sports.

Ralph, a 23-year-old freestyle skier from Helena, qualified for the Olympic men’s freeski slopestyle event on Feb. 7 and will compete in the final beginning at 8:30 a.m. Mountain Time on Tuesday, Feb. 10. The games mark his first Olympic appearance. He is reportedly the first Helena native to be selected for a U.S. Winter Olympic team in more than 50 years. 

Ralph is also scheduled to compete later this week in freeski big air. Qualifying for the big air event is on Feb. 15, with the final round scheduled for Feb. 17. Slopestyle was added to the winter Olympics’ lineup in 2014, while big air became an Olympic event only in 2022.

Ralph advanced out of slopestyle qualifying in Livigno, Italy, on Saturday, posting a top-10 score to earn a spot in the event’s final round at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan. He is scheduled to ski third in the starting order as athletes compete for medals.

For Montana, a state with deep roots in winter sports but relatively few Olympic representatives, Ralph’s qualification has already generated excitement, particularly in his hometown.

Ralph started skiing at Great Divide Ski Area near Helena at the age of two. Over time, that enthusiasm developed into a national-caliber career, culminating in his selection to represent the United States in freestyle skiing at the Olympics. Ralph earned a third-place finish at the 2024 FIS Freestyle World Cup Slopestyle event, was voted “Most Improved” by his U.S. Freeski teammates and staff that same year, and earned a second-place finish at the FIS Freestyle World Cup Big Air in 2025.

Unlike traditional ski racing events, freeski slopestyle is judged without reference to speed. Competitors ski a course featuring rails, boxes and jumps while a panel of judges score the run on a 0 to 100 scale based on difficulty, execution, amplitude and overall flow. In the qualifying round at this year’s Olympics, skiers take two runs, with the best of their two scores counting toward advancement.

Ralph’s first qualifying run was scored 68.91, which proved to be enough to advance. During his opening run, Ralph navigated three rail sections at the top of the course with a series of technical maneuvers before moving into the three jump sections. His run included multiple high-difficulty aerial tricks, each involving combinations of flips and spins, and two including four full airborne rotations. 

In the slopestyle final, each competitor will get three runs, with only the highest score counting toward medal placement.

Ralph’s second Olympic event, freeski big air, presents a different challenge. Big air competitions are built around a single jump, with skiers performing their most difficult aerial tricks for judges. The event emphasizes amplitude of rotation and clean execution, with little margin for error. In both the qualifying and final rounds, skiers take three runs. The two best scores count toward the final total, provided the tricks meet event requirements for variety.

While slopestyle tests an athlete’s ability to link a variety of tricks across an entire course, big air focuses on maximum difficulty in a single trick, requiring both technical skill and precision under pressure. 

Montana Free Press attempted to contact Team USA and Ralph’s parents by phone but was unable to reach them by the time of publication. In a Feb. 6 phone interview with the Bozeman Daily Chronicle, Konnor talked about how it feels to compete for the chance to chase an Olympic medal. 

“I know there’s a lot of pressure, but I’m just trying not to overthink it,” he said. “The goal for the last five years has been to get an Olympic medal, so that’s what I’m going for.”

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Think it’s been a warm winter? You’re not imagining it. An analysis of National Weather Service data by Montana Free Press shows five of Montana’s seven largest cities have recorded daily highs this fall and early winter more than 8 degrees above normal on average, with records for specific days continuing to be set into early February. 

In Billings, Bozeman, Great Falls, Helena and Missoula, the average daily high temperatures from November through January were warmer than any previous winter in weather data dating back to the mid-20th century. Two additional cities where weather logs have been kept for more than a century, Butte and Kalispell, also came close to breaking their records. 

Trent Smith, meteorologist with the Missoula office of the National Weather Service, said in an interview on Thursday that “so far the [western side of Montana] is on par with one of its warmest winters on record” and other than the state’s northeast corner, he said, it’s been a “top-five warmest” winter in most communities.

Northern Montana’s Glasgow, for example, remained closer to long-term norms, representative of other communities in that corner of the state. Smith attributed that to the region being “more exposed” to arctic air due to its latitude and the lack of terrain to break up the jet stream. 

The unusually warm winter has already had tangible effects across the state. In northwestern Montana, unseasonably high December temperatures melted snowpack and contributed to flooding in communities such as Libby. Elsewhere, ski areas across the state have reported snowpacks well below average and many, if not nearly all, of the runs closed.

Across much of the state, the warmth was widespread and persistent. In Billings, where National Weather Service records date back to 1948, the average daily high from late fall to early winter was 47 degrees. That’s 1.4 degrees warmer than the city’s previous high-water mark, set in 1999 — and 9 degrees higher than typical.

Bozeman experienced the most dramatic departure from previous winter records. The average daily high for the November-January period there, 45 degrees, exceeded the historic average by 10 degrees and the next-warmest winter on record since 1941 by 3.5 degrees. Temperature data indicate that three of Bozeman’s warmest winters have happened in the last five years.

In Great Falls and Helena, where records extend back to the late 1930s, winter temperatures were more than 10 degrees above historic norms. Missoula also saw record-high temperatures, with its November-to-January average high 8 degrees above its historic average of 34 degrees and several degrees warmer than the previous record.

It’s harder to beat records in Butte and Kalispell, which have been keeping data since 1894 and 1896, respectively. Butte’s weather through mid-winter was, with an average high of 42.7, about 9 degrees warmer than the historic average and second to only 1917, when average temperatures were just two-tenths of a degree warmer. The average high in Kalispell this year, 38 degrees, was 5 degrees above normal and among only three comparably warm winters since the late 1800s.

Glasgow, in comparison, was still warmer than average this year, with a typical high of 32, but posted winter temperatures much closer to historical norms, ranking near the middle of its post-1948 range.

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After several years of rapid expansion during the COVID-19 pandemic, Montana’s population growth rate has continued settling to a slower pace according to 2025 figures released by the U.S. Census Bureau this week.

The Census Bureau estimates Montana added 7,137 residents between mid-2024 and mid-2025 for an annual growth rate of less than one percent. That’s a modest increase from the roughly 5,900 residents added the previous year but remains far below the nearly 18,000 added in 2021, the peak of the pandemic migration surge. 

The past two years have also seen slightly slower population growth than the pre-pandemic years. Between 2011 and 2019, the state averaged around an annual population increase of 8,800 residents, an annual growth rate of 0.86%.

By comparison, the 7,137 residents added in 2025 translated to a 0.62% increase, the second-lowest growth rate in the past fifteen years after 2024.

Migration continues to be the primary factor driving Montana population change. In 2025, net migration, the number of people who moved into the state minus the number who moved away, added an estimated 7,247 residents. The vast majority, 6,348, moved from other U.S. states while just under 900 were international arrivals, the bureau estimates. 

Without migration, Montana’s population would have barely changed as the state recorded 90 fewer births than deaths in 2025, a reflection of Montana’s older population and low birthrate. While the state has typically seen a few more deaths than births in recent years, the bureau’s statistics saw that trend reverse for the first time since 2019, with 12 more births than deaths.

County-level population data slated for a March release and city-level population expected for May will let statisticians and the public evaluate growth trends specific to different parts of the state. The 2024 data indicated that Kalispell was the fastest growing urban area while Bozeman’s historic growth was slowing.

These annual estimates are part of the Census Bureau’s efforts to track population change between the once-every-ten-years decennial censuses, which is mandated by the U.S. Constitution. Each year’s figure reflects the population as of July 1, so the population growth figure for 2025 estimate measures changes from July 1, 2024, to July 1, 2025.

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Passenger and freight traffic across Montana’s northern border fell sharply in the first 11 months of 2025, with commercial freight seeing the sharpest decline from a for comparable periods in at least 30 years. The number of inbound people crossing also saw the steepest year-over-year percentage declines of recent decades outside of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Data from the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics indicates that the number of full shipping containers crossing the border into Montana by truck or rail for the first 11 months of the year fell 21% from its 30-year peak in 2024. Over the same period, individual crossings dropped 29%. The drop comes after years of sharp increases in freight and individual crossings coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Economy and tourism experts interviewed by MTFP pointed to President Donald Trump’s on-again, off-again tariff battle with Canada as a likely explanation for the drop.

“The decline in visitation is well beyond what could be explained by exchange rates, the Canadian economy, or other typical factors,” said Jeffrey Michael, director of the University of Montana’s Bureau of Business and Economic Research. “It’s clearly related to political tensions between the two countries.”

Michael said he’s seen consistent decreases in both freight and passenger flow at Montana’s ports of entry since February, the month after President Donald Trump took office for his second term. He also said the trend accelerated after the Trump administration announced tariffs in April.

The number of people entering the U.S. at Montana ports dropped to just 200,000 in the first 11 months of 2020, then 163,000 in 2021 — the years of the COVID-19 pandemic border closures — but rebounded to just over one million in 2024. However, they then fell to 736,000 in 2025, a 29% decline, the lowest mark in over 30 years outside of the pandemic.

Racene Friede, president and CEO of Glacier Country Tourism, which promotes tourism in Northwestern Montana, said in an interview with Montana Free Press that the decline in tourism traffic had started after “friction points” in political relations between Canada and the U.S.

“We actually don’t anticipate changing in the near term,” she said.

Friede said the downturn has not affected all visitors equally. Higher-end international travel has remained strong, while other segments have been more volatile. “The luxury market is doing very well,” she said. She also noted uncertainty around the tourism effect of a new international visitor park fee, which imposes a $100 surcharge on visitors to 11 U.S. parks, including Yellowstone and Glacier.

Tourism groups say the decline in crossings is also reflected in spending data.

Brad Niva, president and CEO of Visit Big Sky, which promotes the southwest Montana resort community, said Visa credit card data indicates that Canadian spending in Big Sky is down by nearly 17% from January through September of 2025, even as spending from other international markets increased.

“Canada is our biggest foreign market,” Niva said. “All of our other countries are increasing, except Canada.”

Niva said Big Sky has been less affected than communities closer to the border but still reflects the broader trend. “Are we affected by the Canadian market? Yes — we’ve seen declines in cards, spending and people,” he said.

The drop in visitors from Canada was accompanied by a large drop in container traffic entering at Montana ports.

In total, Montana ports of entry processed about 275,000 full shipping containers in the first 11 months of 2025, down from almost 350,000 for the same period of 2024. The decline reversed several years of growth and exceeded any single-year drop recorded since at least the mid-1990s. 

Since President Donald Trump took office for his second term in early 2025, his administration threatened and then imposed 25 percent duties on many Canadian goods, with a ten percent levy on energy. Trump has also repeatedly floated the idea of making Canada the “51st state” to eliminate the tariffs, a notion that has infuriated many Canadian politicians and citizens.

Brigitta Miranda-Freer, executive director of the Montana World Trade Center, told Montana Free Press that unpredictable trade policy, including tariffs announced “by tweet,” has hurt demand for both exports from Montana and imports from Canada. She also said that many consumers outside of the U.S. seem to be choosing to skip American-made products out of national pride.

“There is a lot of anti-American sentiment in other countries in regards to how we are approaching trade with our long-standing partners,” Miranda-Freer said.

State Sen. Susan Webber, a Browning Democrat whose district includes the Canada-adjacent Blackfeet Reservation, said the effects of higher trade costs are being felt directly by communities along the border, particularly on the reservation, which has two ports of entry into Canada. “People who used to go into Canada for hay, tractor parts and lumber have stopped doing it,” Webber said. Webber is a plaintiff in a suit alleging that the tariffs violate the Jay Treaty. That suit is currently awaiting a ruling in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. 

Webber said the reduction in cross-border trade has disrupted long-standing economic relationships between nearby Canadian and U.S. communities.

“We had a pretty good relationship with producers and services in Canada because we are so close,” Webber said.

Tourism officials said they’ve heard from Canadian visitors that the downturn is not rooted in local relationships or community level issues — and said they’d love to see Canadians return in greater numbers. 

“Everyone we talk to says it isn’t the people,” Friede said. “I like to think of it as, ‘Our parents aren’t getting along, but we’re getting along great.’ ”

This article was updated Jan. 23, 2025 to correct the spelling of BBER director Jeffrey Michael’s name.

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In the four years since Montana began allowing the legal sale of adult-use marijuana on Jan 1, 2022, the state’s retailers have sold more than $1 billion in product as adult-use sales rise more than enough to offset a sharp decline in purchases regulated and taxed as a medical product.

From January 2022 through December 2025, total monthly medical and adult-use marijuana sales increased by about 13% to $27.3 million according to data from the Montana Department of Revenue. Over that same period, monthly medical marijuana sales alone fell by more than 70%. 

The department tabulated $327 million in annual sales last year, 90% of that sales labeled as adult use. Those sales translated into nearly $60 million in tax revenue.

In 2022, Montana dispensaries sold about $304 million in marijuana products, roughly a third of that for medical marijuana sales. By 2025, annual sales had risen to about $327 million — or $287 per capita — with adult-use sales accounting for nearly 90%.

The result is a market that looks markedly different from 2022, when legalized sales approved by voters in 2020 took effect in some counties under implementation law passed by the 2021 Montana Legislature. Medical marijuana, which had been legal to patients with medical marijuana cards since 2004, represented 40% of sales in 2022 but now accounts for around one-tenth of the overall market.

Monthly sales fluctuated throughout the period, typically rising during the summer months and dipping slightly in the winter. Throughout 2022, adult-use sales climbed to nearly $20 million by year’s end. Medical sales declined sharply over the same period, falling from over $10 million in January to less than $6 million by December.

Excluding local-option taxes, medical marijuana sales are taxed at 4%, while adult-use marijuana is taxed at 20% — five times higher. As a result, the growth in adult-use sales generates substantially more revenue than medical marijuana, with annual tax revenues increasing 44% between 2022 and 2025. 

Over the four year period, Montana collected $217 million in marijuana tax revenue. Of that, about $207 million came from adult-use sales, compared with under $10 million for medical.

Some adult-use purchases may still be driven by medical needs, said Kate Cholewa, a Montana-based marijuana policy lobbyist, noting that for many buyers there are “calculations involved” around cost and privacy. People who use small volumes of marijuana for medical purposes, for example, may not recoup the upfront cost of a medical marijuana card that qualifies them for the lower sales tax rate.

“I would suspect there are people in the adult market who are medical,” she said.

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As 2025 closes out, Montana Free Press reporters are reflecting on the work they’ve done over the course of the year — and what they expect to be writing about heading into 2026.

My job is using data to help Montanans understand what’s happening around them. In 2025, that meant turning a lot of messy information into tools and reporting that were useful to our readers.

To start the year, I built the 2025 edition of the Montana Free Press Capitol Tracker, a searchable guide that lets readers find their legislators, follow bills and see how policy moves through the Montana House, Senate and governor’s office. As the session closed, I also analyzed which lawmakers were most successful in passing legislation (and which weren’t).

Beyond politics, I worked with Montana Department of Transportation data to map where crashes happen most often on Montana highways. Among the takeaways: It’s worth taking some extra care on twisty roads around lakes and over mountain passes.

Elections were another major focus. During the 2025 municipal races, I tracked how the state’s new birth-year requirements impacted ballot acceptance rates and examined campaign finance data to show how nominally nonpartisan mayoral races still reflected clear partisan donor patterns.

WHAT’S ON THE HORIZON IN 2026?

In 2026, I expect my data reporting to continue focusing on helping Montanans understand how big, often abstract economic, policy and political shifts show up in their day-to-day lives.

One area I’ll be watching closely is how changes in trade policy ripple through Montana’s economy, particularly agriculture. Whether it’s tariffs, export markets or input costs, those decisions can have uneven effects across regions and commodities. I’m interested in using data to show where those impacts are landing, and who is feeling them most.

Energy is another big question mark. As the Colstrip coal plant ages and owners transfer their shares to Northwestern Energy, the cost of keeping it running, as well as how competitive it is with other sources of energy like wind and hydropower, will influence how Montana’s energy mix and reliability look in the coming years. I’ll also be keeping an eye on energy-hungry data center proposals around the state, and what they mean for local infrastructure, water use and the broader energy grid.

At the same time, we’ll have another round of elections to cover, as voters pick representatives and senators for the 2027 Legislature — and as Democrats try to unseat Republican incumbents in Montana’s federal delegation. There’s no doubt campaign finance data and political analysis will help keep me busy next year.

If you have ideas for data sets I could be looking at — or analyses you’d like an intrepid data reporter to check out — I’m all ears.

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