The media mogul had a lifelong commitment to endangered species, ecotourism and supporting rural agriculture.
Ted Turner owned vast swaths of Western land. What happens to them now?
Posted inMay 2026: Pinecone Cowboys
Colorado’s Arkansas Valley water confronts contamination, climate change and political drama
‘If you don’t have clean water, you really don’t have anything.’
Posted inMay 2026: Pinecone Cowboys
The resilience of the elusive vaquita
Nature’s enduring mysteries buoy efforts to save the most endangered marine mammal on Earth.
Posted inMay 2026: Pinecone Cowboys
The facade of the Red Wind commune
There’s ongoing harm from Indigenous identity fraud.
Posted inArticles
Emails show Interior delivered new drilling permits for Burgum’s billionaire ally
Oil and gas giant Continental Resources wanted the BLM to sign off on new wells in Wyoming, despite a court injunction there. The agency obliged.
Posted inMay 2026: Pinecone Cowboys
Sam the Toucan, capybaras over coffee, Vellela vellela and a mechanical rhino
Mishaps and mayhem from around the region.
Posted inArticles
Controversial gas pipeline across Navajo Nation to begin
The pipeline would eventually cross 234 miles of tribal land. The hearing initiating the project caught community members off guard.
Posted inMay 2026: Pinecone Cowboys
The plight of the pinecone cowboy
The future of Western forests depends on professional pinecone collectors. They’re slowly being starved out of existence.
Posted inMay 2026: Pinecone Cowboys
The dark legacy of the atomic age is still playing out in New Mexico
‘We were a sacrifice zone.’
Posted inMay 2026: Pinecone Cowboys
The Earth loves in species
With the Earth under attack, love will see us through.
Posted inMay 2026: Pinecone Cowboys
What happens when we die?
A new novel brings many longtime subscribers together to ponder an age-old question.
Posted inArticles
Nukes and AI require 1.4 million gallons of water a day at New Mexico lab
In a state that’s already short on the resource, Los Alamos National Laboratory expects to double water use.
Posted inArticles
Wildfires are torching state budgets
Oregon allocated $10 million for the 2024 wildfire season. It cost more than $350 million.
Posted inArticles
As Roadless Rule rollback looms, grassroots hearings take root
In absence of federal meetings, nonprofits step up to hold public comment on Forest Service plan to lift protections from roadless areas.
Posted inArticles
Emergency plans for the Colorado River buy time, not solutions
The federal government ordered Flaming Gorge water released and cuts to Lake Powell releases, to prevent collapse.
Posted inArticles
The ramifications of record-shattering heat on the West’s ecosystems
‘It was the worst possible way to end the winter that was already worse than normal.’
Posted inApril 2026: Inside the Attack on Public Lands
‘Just noticing birds improves your health’
#iamthewest: Giving voice to the people that make up communities in the region.
Posted inArticles
How New Mexico is ‘building a forest’ by solving a seedling shortage
A Q&A with the New Mexico Reforestation Center director about what it takes to replant a burn scar post-wildfire.
Posted inApril 2026: Inside the Attack on Public Lands
Wildfires transform soil, turning a nutrient into poisonous chromium-6
New research shows how severe blazes create a carcinogen and how long it might persist.