Author ponders Wilderness Act on its 50th birthday.
On the Wilderness Act’s 50th, a backpack into the Weminuche
Posted inGoat
In Southcentral Alaska, salmon declines are pinned on a toothy invader
Earlier this month, I wrote about the Yukon River’s chinook salmon runs, which have lately plummeted for reasons that remain murky. While researchers are years from cracking that mystery, the Yukon isn’t the only Alaskan river losing its salmon. In the state’s Susitna River basin, which courses through Southcentral Alaska near Anchorage, the mighty fish […]
Posted inWotr
The battle for women’s suffrage continues
In Montana, no woman has held federal office since 1916, when Montanans elected their first and only female Congressional representative.
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
Reflections on the Wilderness Act at 50
The concept may need some rethinking, but it’s still an important way to preserve some of our most treasured land.
Posted inGoat
Of packrat poop, creosote bush and juniper-fed lamb
Scientists find that gut bacteria can help animals digest toxic plants.
Posted inWotr
Our reliance on drones to patrol the borders
When I think of Canada, I picture caribou herds, universal healthcare and the occasional hockey brawl. Officials at our Department of Homeland Security, however, seem to think the neighbors up North pose a serious security threat. After all, the department has spent the last five years quietly building a fleet of unmanned aerial vehicles — […]
Posted inGoat
A bison boost for Native economies
“Buffalo is better for you than skinless chicken,” Karlene Hunter will tell you. “It has more omega-3s than an avocado.” Hunter is a member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota and CEO of Native American Natural Foods. The company, which she cofounded in 2007, makes all-natural, low-calorie buffalo […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
WWII code talkers, cleaning Utah caverns and more
COLORADOAnyone who reads a blog called Government Executive now knows that some U.S. Environmental Protection Agency staffers are not just unhappy; they also appear un-housebroken. In the agency’s Denver office, for example, there have been several incidents of “inappropriate bathroom behavior, including defecating in the hallway.” Managers said they were trying to find the culprit […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
We’re prepared to buy back our own land
On June 9, 1855, the Cayuse, Umatilla and Walla Walla people agreed to a treaty that ceded 6.4 million acres of land to the United States, in what would become northeast Oregon and southwest Washington. In return for that lavish gift, 250,000 acres were reserved for the tribes, “all of which tract shall be set […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
Visitors from Maine to Montana
Summer’s in full swing in Paonia, Colorado, our tiny hometown. The North Fork Valley’s sunny weather, scrumptious fruit and fine wines draw lots of visitors, and we’re always delighted when friends old and new drop by our office. Andreas (Andy) Mink, who reports for the Sunday edition of Neue Zurcher Zeitung, Switzerland’s leading paper, spent […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
Support what you preserve
It’s nice to see more land set aside for conservation and our future children and grandchildren, but this must be accompanied by federal funds to support the infrastructure (“What the president can do right now for conservation,” HCN, 5/26/14). That means our dear leaders need to allocate enough money for people to monitor the parks, […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
Predatory Ugliness
Jonathan Thompson’s terrific piece about the payday loan business (“A pimp in the family,” HCN, 6/23/14) spotlights some of the ugliest elements of the financial services business. Predatory lenders have found a lucrative niche in the largely unregulated world that flourishes in poor communities with immediate cash needs – like Native American reservations. Indeed, as […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
Photos of Bonneville Salt Flats
The Bonneville Salt Flats: Two Decades of Photography by Peter Vincent Peter Vincent with essays by Peter de Lory, Philip Linhares, Tom Fritz and others, 272 pages, hardcover: $85. Stance & Speed. 2013. “Salt fever”: That’s what drives thousands of people each year to gather with their hotrods, cars and motorcycles on the Utah-Nevada border, […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
On booms and their remains
Click here to see a full gallery of Sarah Christianson’s photographs of the Bakken oil boom. In 1973, during North Dakota’s second oil boom, then-Gov. Art Link declared, “When we are through with that and the landscape is quiet again … let those who follow and repopulate the land be able to say our grandparents […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
Mustang modification
The Horse Lover: A Cowboy’s Quest to Save the Wild MustangsH. Alan Day with Lynn Wiese Sneyd, Foreword by Sandra Day O’Connor264 pages, hardcover:$24.95.University of Nebraska Press, 2014. You’ve heard of The Horse Whisperer. Now, meet The Horse Lover, a cowboy on a mission to save wild mustangs – 1,500 of them, all nickering and […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
Motorheads gone wild
An off-roading conservationist navigates some gnarly landscape on the road to more protection for the Utah desert.
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
Love that dirty river
Every year, I dutifully respond to those High Country News reader surveys in the fervent hope that you will devote more of your valuable real estate to urban-oriented stories about our region’s social injustices. Well, there is a Santa Claus, and he delivered a wonderful gift to me in the form of Daniel Person’s pitch-perfect “River of No Return” […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
Farmers for clear water rule
I read your coverage of the proposed new clean water ruling by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency with interest (“Muddy waters of the U.S.,” HCN, 6/23/14; “Is the Clean Water Act under attack?” hcn.org, 6/24/14), and wish to add a few sentiments to the mix. For more than 100 years, the Rocky Mountain Farmers Union […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
An artist’s road to redemption
The PainterPeter Heller288 pages, hardcover:$24.95.Alfred A. Knopf, 2014. If it’s possible to paint in words alone, to create a wildly colorful story of grief in sentences layered like one of van Gogh’s swirling night scenes, Colorado author Peter Heller accomplishes it in his second novel, The Painter, narrated by artist Jim Stegner. A fly fisherman […]