Ranchers and environmentalists in Wyoming are still squabbling over wolves as the animal bounces on and off the endangered species list.

Type: The Mormon Church works to ban gay marriage in California, even as gay people in places like Rexburg, Idaho, come out of the LDS closet.

A long time ago, the earth warmed considerably; now, scientists study fossils to find out what happened – and what it might mean for us today.

Jared Farmer speaks in praise of Utah’s neglected “low country” landscapes – places like Utah Lake.

In the quest for the ultimate firefighting machine, the BLM in Nevada has turned to some very big, very strange, and very foreign vehicles: Unimogs from Germany and Tatras from the Czech Republic.

Steve and Marc Jenson have ambitious plans to turn a failed ski resort near Beaver, Utah, into a private enclave for the ultra-rich, but not everyone is thrilled about the idea.

Barred owls are driving threatened spotted owls out of their Northwest forest territory. Is it time to shoot them?

The Grand Old Party will either find a new life – or court self-destruction – in the West today, where moderates and hard-liners are battling over conservation issues.

For years, Native Americans, fishermen and farmers have battled over the Klamath River in southern Oregon and Northern California, but finally a complicated truce is in the works.

Jeffrey Lockwood believes that the modern West could use an infusion of old-fashioned Cowboy Mythology.

The women in Stefanie Raymond-Whish’s family have a history of breast cancer, and the young Navajo biologist wants to know whether the uranium on the reservation might have something to do with it.

An energy boom of unprecedented proportions is transforming western Colorado towns like Rifle, which just recently recovered from the last big energy boom – and a catastrophic bust.

Craig Childs explores the fine line that separates archeology from grave-robbing in the American Southwest.

After conquering rocks, trails and mountains, weekend warriors have found a new hobby: Climbing the West’s big trees.

Ray Ring takes a personal, painful look at the West’s suicidal tendencies, as shown in the life and death of his brother, John.

The Navajo Nation is determined to finally claim its rightful share of the Colorado River after 86 years of being left out of the region’s water politics.

California’s Salton Sea is at a crossroads, but whether it dries up and blows away or is restored and rejuvenated, the future does not look bright for its resident renegades, retirees and recluses.

A copper-mining company is courting Superior, Ariz., but the former mining town – now re-inventing itself as a modest tourist haven – is unsure whether it really wants a new marriage with extractive industry

Public-land managers in the era of global warming face uncomfortable choices: Do they intervene to protect dying plants and animals, or stand back and let this new version of “nature” take its course?

The Interior West’s growing political voice – and its status as the nation’s energy supplier – mean presidential candidates need to see the region as more than campaign flyover country.

In Catron County, N.M., an attempt to reintroduce endangered Mexican wolves has fallen into chaos in the wake of political misjudgments, local hostility and problems caused by inbreeding among the wolves.

The fiercely conservative lawyers of the Sagebrush Rebellion continue to fight against environmental regulations, but despite all their sound and fury, very little has changed on the public lands.

Scientists unleash a new weapon in the fight against invasive tamarisk – a tiny exotic beetle from Kazakhstan.

The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California – the West’s most powerful water agency – uses a shrewd blend of Wall Street tactics and rural diplomacy to keep the water flowing to L.A. and its environs.

This special issue focuses on books and essays that help us understand the complex, chaotic West.