GRAND TETON NATIONAL PARK, Wyo. (11,600′) – With the Middle Teton Glacier glistening on one side, the jagged West Face of the Grand Teton looming above on the other, and most of eastern Idaho spread out like a tablecloth far below, the Lower Saddle is a breathtaking place. But something else is taking my breath […]
Jon Waldman
Posted inAugust 19, 2002: The Great Western Apocalypse
Mi rio, mi agua
TEXAS Tension over Rio Grande water – or the lack of it – is rising to an all-time high. Under the terms of a 1944 treaty, Mexico owes the U.S. almost 1.5 million acre-feet (456 billion gallons) of water – a debt the country amassed over the last decade of drought. The shortage is leaving […]
Posted inAugust 19, 2002: The Great Western Apocalypse
Bikers waffle on wilderness
CALIFORNIA A new proposal to add two and half million acres to California’s 14 million acres of wilderness is gaining support, but not from the International Mountain Bicycling Association (IMBA). Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., says her California Wild Heritage Act will protect the land from logging, oil drilling and road building. IMBA, however, is leery […]
Posted inAugust 19, 2002: The Great Western Apocalypse
Shrinking water supply makes room for birds
Note: in the print edition of this issue, this article appears as a sidebar to one of this issue’s feature stories, “Attack of the bark beetles.” This year’s drought is bad news for most wildlife, but not for the endangered southwestern willow flycatchers at Roosevelt Lake in Arizona. During the six years of drought since […]
Posted inAugust 19, 2002: The Great Western Apocalypse
The sod squad wants to soak you
Look out, you water scofflaws – it’s “water-efficiency month,” and enforcement agencies across the West will not look lightly upon water-wasting infractions. Water cops are tossing out tickets that range from a slap on the wrist (and a free how-to-conserve-water brochure) for leaky faucets, to a $1,000 fine and up to a year in jail […]
Posted inAugust 5, 2002: Land or money?
It’s the dog days for prairie dogs
The West’s prairie dog populations are in bad shape. Of the five species in the West, two are already on the endangered species list, while a third is a candidate for listing (HCN, 2/1/99: Ranchers don’t want refugee prairie dogs). No one has been looking out for the white-tailed prairie dog – until now. In […]
Posted inAugust 5, 2002: Land or money?
Lewis and Clark revisited
Ever wanted to hear the unauthorized version of the Lewis and Clark expedition? Listen to stories that have been passed down through generations of Indian tribes at the Save Our Wild Salmon Coalition’s commemoration of the Lewis and Clark bicentennial. The Aug. 15-16 gathering will examine the link between salmon, tribes and the expedition, and […]
Posted inAugust 5, 2002: Land or money?
Utah gases up
Major oil and gas development is one step closer to fruition on 2 million acres of public land in northeastern Utah. Geophysical surveying company Veritas DGC Inc. recently submitted a draft environmental assessment, proposing two-dimensional seismic exploration in the Book Cliffs area. Instead of using behemoth thumper trucks, Veritas plans to detonate 7,500 underground explosives […]
Posted inAugust 5, 2002: Land or money?
N.D. court ruling rescinds tribal authority
Decision paves the way for dam construction on sacred burial ground
Posted inJuly 8, 2002: The anatomy of fire
Prescribed burns tame the beast
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Ten days after the Hayman fire erupted southwest of Denver, Colo., and began spreading to the north and east, firefighters finally found a place where they could stand their ground: Polhemus Gulch. Weeks earlier, firefighters there gained the upper hand against the Schoonover Fire; […]
Posted inJune 24, 2002: The buzz business
Growth boundary grows
COLORADO All along the Front Range of the Colorado Rockies, development continues to roll out like freshly laid sod. Five years ago, in an effort to limit sprawl, a voluntary association of business leaders, developers and elected officials from 48 local governments drew up a plan that included an urban growth boundary. But the growth […]
Posted inJune 24, 2002: The buzz business
A wide-angled wilderness
WASHINGTON Washington state could soon gain a unique new wilderness area – its first in almost 15 years. Unlike most of Washington’s 4 million acres of federally protected wilderness, the proposed Wild Sky Wilderness northeast of Seattle would encompass more than just high alpine crags of rock and ice – it would also include often-ignored […]
Posted inJune 10, 2002: Hatching reform
Interior’s conflicting interests
Deputy Interior Secretary J. Steven Griles is in a pickle. Last month, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency effectively delayed the drilling of 39,000 coalbed-methane wells in Wyoming’s Powder River Basin – a major energy project Griles and the Bush administration had hoped to expedite (HCN, 11/5/01: Wyoming’s powder keg ). The EPA rated Interior’s environmental […]
Posted inMay 27, 2002: Wolf at the door
We’d like 2,387 salmon and a Pepsi, please
A new federal report enumerates, for the first time, exactly how many wild salmon and steelhead need to survive for them to be removed from the endangered species list. The report, produced by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), suggests specific annual fish populations in more than 60 tributaries of the Columbia River. The figures […]
Posted inMay 27, 2002: Wolf at the door
Expatriate fish could return a hero
The cure for the exotic whirling disease, a fatal malady in trout, could – ironically – lie in a foreign fish. Researchers recently found that Hofer rainbow trout, the offspring of Pacific rainbow trout taken to Germany in 1880, are 10 to 100 times less susceptible to whirling disease than native U.S. rainbow trout, thanks […]