Following publication of “Pinecone Cowboys,”a feature story in our May 2026 issue, we discovered that the author misrepresented details of his reporting, leading to significant errors in both the story’s framing and its factuality. We learned that the author was never in the field with the main source; that the term “pinecone cowboys” is not commonly used by the people in the industry; and that some of the quotes the author attributed to sources have been contested as inaccurate. Pinecone collecting is a real occupation with important conservation implications, and the photos taken by Nina Riggio are factual. High Country News takes accuracy seriously and employs fact-checkers for all reported pieces, but we failed to catch the inaccuracies in the reporting. We deeply regret the errors.
A detailed analysis of our editorial process, the allegations, and results from our subsequent investigation will be available here by July 1.