The stunningly beautiful photographs on HCN’s Aug. 4 cover and illustrating “Idaho’s Sewer System” effectively neutralize the incisive messages in Richard Manning’s well-researched article. I bet any Idaho Big Ag exec would be proud to display any one of these on a corporate waiting room wall. After all, do not these crystalline-sharp, color-saturated views convey the […]
Beautifying degradation
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At ease by a creek in the wilderness
I am on my way to Kootenai Creek, a neighbor and laughing friend who spends all day, all year, all everything, tumbling down the western side of the Bitterroot Mountains in southwestern Montana. This is the edge of the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness, over a million acres of forest that stretches between Montana and Idaho. Kootenai Creek […]
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Celebrating the birth of the Wilderness Act
High Country News coverage of the evolution of wilderness since 1970.
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We need new words for the Bakken boom
I live in western North Dakota in an area filled with life, from feisty small towns to wildlife, prairies, a national park and the national grasslands. But all of this has been buried underneath one simple term: The Bakken. The Bakken is the geological term for a shale formation of the same name that extends […]
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Yes, wildlife contraception works
When my 12-year-old son encounters any phenomenon that doesn’t yet fit into his worldview, he’ll sometimes ask, “Dad, is that a ‘thing,’” meaning, is it something worth caring about? This isn’t just my son’s problem, of course; at times we all face bewildering novelty. And if it’s a thing like a new technology that makes […]
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Want a trophy buck? Ditch the camo and get a guide
Study looks at successful types of big game hunters
Posted inSeptember 1, 2014: Lost in the Woods
Zen and the art of wildflower science
In the Rocky Mountains, a long-term study yields surprises.
Posted inSeptember 1, 2014: Lost in the Woods
Murder in Old San Francisco
Review of ‘Frog Music’ by Emma Donoghue
Posted inSeptember 1, 2014: Lost in the Woods
Sovereign contempt
Astoria: John Jacob Astor and Thomas Jefferson’s Lost Pacific Empire:A Story of Wealth, Ambition and SurvivalPeter Stark366 pages, hardcover: $27.99.HarperCollins, 2014. Everyone knows about the Lewis and Clark Expedition of 1804-’06, but another entrepreneurial foray a few years later — larger, bolder, and, ultimately, a debacle – has fallen into historical oblivion. The Astor Expedition […]
Posted inSeptember 1, 2014: Lost in the Woods
A dam difficult job
California’s drought through the eyes of a water manager.
Posted inSeptember 1, 2014: Lost in the Woods
Wildfire and bare-bottom bike riders
Mishaps and mayhem from around the region.
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Rants from the Hill: The Bucket List
When making a to-do list is the most important thing on your to-do list.
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Fracking Georgia O’Keeffe Country
Drill rigs pop up near Navajo communities, Chaco Canyon and the iconic Black Place.
Posted inSeptember 1, 2014: Lost in the Woods
From paradise to Paonia
Here in HCN’s tiny hometown, Paonia, Colorado, we remain amazed by — and grateful for — all the folks who drop by just to say hello, since Paonia is on the way to pretty much nowhere else. Ulli Lange, 80, and family and friends, visited right before July Fourth and Paonia’s Cherry Days celebration. Ulli, […]
Posted inSeptember 1, 2014: Lost in the Woods
Watching the world slip away
How our children respond to a world threatened by climate change.
Posted inSeptember 1, 2014: Lost in the Woods
Forestry fandango
In 2013, the U.S. Forest Service thinned and intentionally burned more than 2 million acres of the nation’s public land, which is largely in the West, in order to improve forest health and reduce the risk of destructive wildfires near houses and towns. That’s an impressive figure, until you consider that the agency itself acknowledges […]
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Shaken and stirred in California’s recent earthquake
How seismic events can make drought impacts worse.
Posted inSeptember 1, 2014: Lost in the Woods
Lost in the woods
How the Forest Service is botching its biggest restoration project.
Posted inSeptember 1, 2014: Lost in the Woods
Smoke and mirrors
Congress can’t seem to solve a big problem: how to pay for battling wildfires.
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Two political elites prevail in Navajo primary melee
Shirley and Deschene pull ahead of 15 other candidates.