California’s fall from grace hit me in 2007, at around 9,000 feet in the Sierra Nevada. A friend and I were returning from a backpacking trip, still about a mile-and-a-half deep in the Mokelumne Wilderness, when a stroller rattled around a bend in the trail, its tiny passenger jabbering away as Dad navigated the rocky […]
Matt Weiser
Posted inFebruary 17, 2014: The Gila $olution
The Sacramento-San Joaquin deltas of 1772 and today
Remembering explorers past of this California water source.
Posted inApril 18, 2011: Muddy Waters
Sedimentation is a building problem in the West’s reservoirs
Gary Esslinger, manager of Elephant Butte Irrigation District in southern New Mexico, spends as much time moving silt as he does water. Elephant Butte Reservoir, built in 1915, is fed by the naturally muddy Rio Grande, which drains 28,000 square miles of easily eroded desert in two states. Sediment has claimed 600,000 acre-feet of its […]
Posted inJuly 25, 2005: The Many Faces of Richard Pombo
Will the real Mr. Pombo please stand up?
Rep. Richard Pombo, known as the Jerry Falwell of the property-rights movement, has threatened to dynamite the nation’s bedrock environmental laws. Now, he says, he’s learning to compromise.
Posted inJuly 25, 2005: The Many Faces of Richard Pombo
Pombo’s power grows — and so do the scandals
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Will the real Mr. Pombo please stand up?“ Richard Pombo had a relatively trouble-free career in Congress until 2003, when he became chairman of the powerful House Resources Committee. Since then, he has been linked to a number of scandals. “The problem with Pombo […]
Posted inMay 30, 2005: Write-off on the Range
A massive restoration program may have nothing left to save
Food chain collapsing in the California Delta
Posted inWotr
Pets gone wild have no place in nature
I recently learned that an old acquaintance died — was killed, in fact. No, tortured to death, actually. It was a threatened desert tortoise I knew in Yucca Valley, Calif., near Joshua Tree National Park. Its home was the scrub and rocks near a former neighbor’s rural home, and it would trek to her doorway […]
Posted inMarch 7, 2005: Anarchy in the Gas Fields
Forest Service employees and activist face racketeering charges
Developers’ attempt to silence critics of condo project could make history
Posted inJune 9, 2003: How we see the West
Giant sequoias could get the ax
In a national monument, the Forest Service wants to cut trees to save them
Posted inSeptember 16, 2002: The Royal Squeeze
Some see economic upside in loss of farm water
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. CALEXICO, Calif. – Jose Valles may not know it just yet, but he’s on the cusp of what could be a radically different Imperial Valley economy. Valles, a field worker for 14 of his 32 years, is learning English and training to become a […]
Posted inAugust 19, 2002: The Great Western Apocalypse
New desert town no home to the fringe-toed lizard
Massive development could doom the dunes
Posted inMay 13, 2002: Beyond ecology: Restoring a cultural landscape
Does desert cross cross the line?
CALIFORNIA A white cross cemented atop a rock outcropping in Mojave National Preserve has become the center of a fight over religious freedom on public land. The six-foot cross, made of metal pipes, was erected in 1934 by the Veterans of Foreign Wars and has served as a local gathering point for Easter sunrise services. […]
Posted inApril 15, 2002: Raising a stink
The oldest living thing is a quiet survivor
The oldest living thing in the world is hard to find, and soon I’m lost. I drive out a rutted dirt road south of Barstow, Calif., in search of “King Clone,” a creosote bush identified as the oldest living thing on Earth. Said to be 11,700 years old, that makes it centuries older than the […]
Posted inDecember 17, 2001: Bad moon rising
Gold may bury tribe’s path to its past
Bush administration revives mine project in Southern California
Posted inNovember 19, 2001: Bringing back the bosque
Bonneville trout denied protection
GREAT BASIN Environmental groups have stepped up to the plate three times for the Bonneville cutthroat trout since 1979, asking the Fish and Wildlife Service to grant the trout a slot on the endangered species list. On Oct. 9, the agency threw the fish’s defenders their third strike. Officials said that threats to cutthroat habitat, […]
Posted inNovember 5, 2001: Wyoming's powder keg
Cattle make way for tortoises in the Mojave
Closures could spark a modern-day range war