Magazine
February 18, 2002
The last issue of the "Imagine a River" series on the Rio Grande examines how the river has become the "Rio Wimpy," running out of water twice before it reaches the Gulf of Mexico.
Feature
The last issue of the "Imagine a River" series on the Rio
Grande examines how the river has become the "Rio Wimpy," running
out of water twice before it reaches the Gulf of Mexico.
A journey down the Lower Rio Grande through Texas and
Mexico finds a sometimes-waterless river that faces a host of
environmental, agricultural and human problems.
Essays
Environmentalists adopt the conservative strategy of
working to derail the nomination of federal judges whom they fear
could harm their cause.
Writers on the Range
With each flood of newcomers to the Interior West,
specialized knowledge of place and culture is both lost and
gained.
In the extremely unlikely event that any wolves
reintroduced to Colorado began eating people, the writer says he
would gladly volunteer to serve as a meal.
The writer says that California's much-prized eucalyptus
trees are really overgrown, fire-prone weeds that would be better
off in their native Australia.
Dear Friends
An educational journey down the Rio Grande; top books
about Montana; visitors; misspellings.
News
The Bush administration picks Wyoming resident Paul
Hoffman to run the BLM as assistant secretary of the Interior for
fish, wildlife and parks.
Under pressure from ranchers, Gov. Dirk Kempthorne and
other conservatives, Rod Sando resigns from his position as
director of Idaho's Department of Fish and Game.
Salvage logging plan for Montana's burned Bitterroot
forest meets approval; Dakota, Minnesota & Eastern Railroad
line approved; experimental program would kill coyotes to save sage
grouse in Idaho and Utah; Steven A. Williams new director of
USFWS.
Endangered condors reintroduced in the West are dying,
many from lead poisoning caused by the bullets in the carcasses
they feed on.
Activists are fighting a copper and silver mine planned
for underneath the Cabinet Mountains Wilderness in
Montana.
Anti-grazing activist Joe Feller is leading the fight
against BLM-approved projects in Arizona's Arrastra Mountain
Wilderness that include an improved access road to a rancher's
inholding.
Tucson, Ariz., development foes are upset by a plan to
sell land that was given to the Boy Scouts by a local rancher 30
years ago.
Defenders of Wildlife and the Wyoming Wilderness Society
are paying an Idaho sheep rancher to move to a different grazing
allotment, so that grizzly bears can safely live on the original
allotment.
The Utah Division of Wildlife Resources' plan to use
helicopters to relocate moose on Interstate 80 is halted when one
of the helicopters crashes, killing three.
Residents of Colorado's San Luis Valley are pleased at the
prospect of the Great Sand Dunes National Monument adding the
neighboring Baca Ranch and becoming a national park.
Archaeologists are appalled at Anasazi Digs, a
family-owned business near Monticello, Utah, that plans to sell the
right to dig and keep artifacts from prehistoric ruins on private
land.
Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt startles environmentalists with his
suggestion for a new national monument on the San Rafael
Swell.
Heard Around the West
Guns a-plenty in Utah; dangerous tweezers; diplomatic
liquor flows into Utah, along with ambitious hookers; Salt Lake
hikes up rents; Colorado's reborn "Mountain Gazette"; tumbleweed
problems in eastern Washington.
Letters
Sidebar
Terrible birth defects among newborns in the Lower Rio
Grande Valley may be caused by agricultural and industrial
pollution, but no one knows for sure.
Refuges such as the Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge are
among the few scattered fragments of habitat left in Texas' Lower
Rio Grande Valley.
