The Navajo Nation is determined to finally claim its rightful share of the Colorado River after 86 years of being left out of the region’s water politics.
Seeking the Water Jackpot
For almost a century, the Navajo Tribe has been left out of the Colorado River water game. Now, they’re ready to play their hand.
Two weeks in the West
Tired of smog-ridden suburban sprawl and strip malls? Perhaps it’s time to escape to one of the West’s national forests, parks or other sundry public lands for a deep, calming breath of fresh air. But even that Western staple is becoming as hard to find as affordable real estate in a ski town. The federal…
Bush brings more green into the green movement
“Bush has been good to us,” says Kevin Lind, director of the Powder River Basin Resource Council, a small Wyoming environmental group that pressures coalbed-methane drillers to behave responsibly. Lind doesn’t mean that President George W. Bush has suddenly become benevolent or relaxed his hard-line anti-green stance. Rather, he means that during Bush’s reign in…
Getting the salt out
About five times a year we fly a small private plane from Arizona to California and back, and our route often takes us just to the north of the Salton Sea (HCN, 3/03/08). We’ve often wondered what it’s like on the ground. Now we know, and we don’t need to land to see it for…
Homeward bound
I was touched by Ana Maria Spagna’s essay, “Staying Put” (HCN, 3/03/08). As parents to two elderly-but-still-healthy, but nonetheless dependent and emotionally needy cats, we stay home quite a bit. And I’ve been hoping for a long time to hear someone in authority, or aspiring to authority, suggest to the American people that we might…
Block that mine
I was pleased to read your article “Reluctant Boomtown,” which focused on the multitude of problems connected with the possible return of copper mining to the town of Superior, Ariz. (HCN, 2/18/08). It seems that in Superior some residents favor the mine and some oppose it. You briefly mention another proposal, on the oak and…
Geothermal is no joke
What a pleasant surprise to read James Yearling’s informative piece about geothermal energy (HCN, 2/18/08). As a volcanologist who spent much of his 32-year career researching geothermal resources for the U.S. Geological Survey, I’m used to seeing geothermal treated like the comedian Rodney Dangerfield … getting no respect. This lack of respect is in spite…
(Man-made) smoke gets in your eyes
Richard Halsey, discussed in Judith Lewis’ story “The Chaparralian,” should not assume that because lightning-caused fires in coastal California are rare, all fire there is historically rare (HCN, 2/04/08). In his book Forgotten Fires: Native Americans and the Transient Wilderness, anthropologist Omer C. Stewart argues persuasively, using documentation and physical evidence, that for thousands of…
Finding beauty in devastation
Chris Peterson might be the best wildlife photographer you’ve never heard of. With quiet effort over many years of working for the Hungry Horse News, a weekly based in Columbia Falls, Mont., Peterson has honed his craft – stalking birds, bears, gravity-defying mountain goats and the other denizens of Glacier National Park. He captures them…
Remembering our wildness
What’s so great about being human? Granted, we are, as author Craig Childs acknowledges, “members of a species famous for road building, artwork, and claims of superiority … able to ask many questions and give voluminous answers.” We invented the wheel and the Internet, the vacuum cleaner and the Clapper. But in his latest work,…
Heard Around the West
UTAH Even after he was caught making an outrageously racist remark, Republican state Sen. Chris Buttars refused to resign. Buttars had criticized a revenue-sharing bill for school districts, saying, “This baby is black, I’ll tell you. This is a dark and ugly thing.” Buttars said he was sorry, but he apologized only after the Senate…
Stay in the Hunt
Jim Posewitz believes the hunters’ nose-to-the-ground ethic can save the planet
Falling off the heat ladder
Or … Daniel Boone never dug a snow cave
From the backcountry to the building zoo
The summer after graduating from college, we shared the best job in the world. Armed with a GPS unit, a digital camera and the keys to an electric-blue Dodge Durango, we were charged with tracking down and evaluating the condition of historic structures in Yosemite National Park. Since no map existed of the nearly 700…
The elephant that was left out of the room …
When you read Matt Jenkins’ cover story in this issue, there’s a good chance you’ll be a bit surprised and even somewhat outraged. You’ll learn that hundreds of homes on the Navajo Nation are without running water, despite the fact that, no matter how you slice it, the tribe has rights to a substantial piece…
Dear friends
WELCOME, SARAH GILMAN She’s baaaa-aaa-ck! We’re pleased to welcome former HCN intern Sarah Gilman as our new assistant editor. A Colorado native, Sarah was born and raised in Boulder. She earned a bachelor’s degree in biology and studio art at Whitman College in Washington state in 2004. The pull of the Rocky Mountains was too…