In the not-too-distant future, when some Oregon residents plug their laptops into an electrical outlet they could be using juice generated by the fierce waves that roll shoreward along the Pacific Northwest coast. An early step toward this possibility is scheduled to happen next month when a barge will carry a 260-ton buoy to a […]
Promise of the Sea
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
The Bay Area Chevron explosion shows gaps in refinery safety
When a crude-processing unit at Chevron’s Richmond, Calif., refinery burst into flame in early August, sirens wailed through local neighborhoods as pillars of smoke blackened the sky over the city and surrounding hillsides. The plant’s emergency management system issued 18,000 calls to nearby residents, urging them to “shelter in place” — closing windows, sealing cracks […]
Posted inWotr
Don’t ever forget Cecil Garland
Cecil Garland is not well known beyond the Big Blackfoot River of western Montana. But in this scenic valley, he is remembered as the hardware store owner and WWII veteran who led a 10-year fight to designate the 240,000-acre Scapegoat Wilderness. He is a legend among conservationists, largely because the Scapegoat was the first wilderness […]
Posted inRange
Rants from the Hill: Pleistocene rewilding
“Rants from the Hill” are Michael Branch’s monthly musings on life in the high country of Nevada’s western Great Basin desert. In a 2006 article [PDF] in The American Naturalist, a small herd of perfectly respectable conservation biologists advocates a bold ecological restoration project they call “Pleistocene Rewilding.” The concept itself is outrageously wild. First […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
Rehberg and Tester: Policy differences
Jon Tester, a conservative Democrat: Sen. Tester sponsored the controversial measure that took Northern Rockies wolves off the endangered species list in 2011 — a move praised by ranchers and elk hunters. It triggered disagreements among environmentalists. (Some liked it and some condemned it.) He also: • Sponsored a bill that guaranteed 678,000 acres of […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
Who is Denny Rehberg, really?
The three candidates look too formal for Montana, dressed in suits and neckties for the first debate in the state’s most important race this election season. But the setting is classic Montana: A pine-paneled room in a lodge on the edge of the Big Sky ski resort, beside a trout-filled river surrounded by mid-June wildflowers. […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
Mother nature’s hot heyday
I really think that proper defensible space during the High Park fire was a crapshoot (HCN, 8/6/12, ‘Lessons burned?’). The fire moved so fast, with the intense wind gusts, through such dry and dead vegetation, that even if you had 30 feet of defensible space, your house could have easily caught fire. I live in […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
Money trumps prudence
The picture here is one of common sense and ethical behavior being given up and replaced with an attitude of do whatever it takes to make money (HCN, 8/6/12, ‘The Bakken’s shadow boom‘). Where do they think billions of gallons of polluted water are going to go when reinjected into the very same rock formations […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
Misleading omissions
‘The Secret Gardens‘ is offensive and misleading in that it makes it seem as if the Coast Salish lived only in the past (HCN, 8/6/12). It makes no mention of the modern Coast Salish tribes who no doubt know a lot about these camas patches. Has botanist Madrona Murphy contacted any of the Duwamish, Jamestown, […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
Madrona Murphy responds
Unfortunately, camas cultivation in the San Juan archipelago effectively ended more than 150 years ago. All the same, this study was extensively informed by interviews with living Coast Salish families with ancestry in the islands or ties to the islands, as well as unpublished field notes of interviews conducted 25 to 65 years ago with […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
(Don’t) Let it burn
This summer, Forest Service firefighters are stomping out wildfires they might have let burn in other years. A ‘temporary’ policy change requires local foresters to get permission from their regional supervisors for anything but full suppression, owing to fears that the current hot, dry conditions could cause remote fires to rage out of control. And […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
Adopt a biologist
One way outdoor-gear companies could help improve their image and be more effective would be to put some of the millions spent on advertising and sponsorships into conservation organizations (HCN, 7/23/12, ‘The Hardest Climb‘). Sponsor field biologists, conservation groups and field stations rather than athletes. Biologists use these companies’ equipment just as much, and often […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
A way out of California’s water morass?
This well-written piece accurately portrays the problems and solutions facing California’s beleaguered Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta (HCN, 8/20/12, ‘Tunneling under California’s water wars‘). Current operations in the Delta have failed to provide water to family farmers and 25 million Californians, and failed to protect the region’s ecosystem. Doing nothing to improve this situation means more of […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
Return to innocence: A review of Queen of America
Queen of AmericaLuis Alberto Urrea492 pages, softcover:$14.99.Little, Brown and Company, 2011. It’s hard to be a saint, but being a saint’s father, husband or friend can’t be easy, either. ‘Not all crosses are made of wood,’ as Luis Alberto Urrea observes in his novel Queen of America. It’s a sequel to his 2005 book, […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
High Country News hires an associate designer
Andy Cullen, HCN‘s new associate designer, drove more than 2,000 miles to get to our office in Paonia, Colo., for his first day on the job. Andy, who earned his bachelor’s degree in journalism, with a concentration in photojournalism, in 2005 at Boston University, spent four years in the Peace Corps in Bangladesh and Mongolia […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
Beyond ozone
Wintertime ozone is just one surprising air-quality problem that has appeared as gas fields balloon in size and creep closer to communities. “It’s possible that emissions have been there all along,” since the industry isn’t new, says Ramón Alvarez, an Environmental Defense Fund air-quality expert. But with drilling under increasing scrutiny, he says, “People are […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
Book note: Valley of Shadows and Dreams
Valley of Shadows and Dreams Ken Light and Melanie Light, Foreword by Thomas Steinbeck 176 pages, hardcover: $40. Heyday Books, 2012. ‘Except for the perimeter, every single living thing had been placed where someone had planned it to be and placed it just so,’ writes Melanie Light, describing her first experience flying over California’s Central […]
Posted inSeptember 3, 2012: Identity Politics, Montana Style
A parent lost and found: A review of Descanso for My Father: Fragments of a Life
Descanso for My Father: Fragments of a LifeBy Harrison Candelaria Fletcher147 pages, softcover: $14.95.University of Nebraska Press, 2012. When Colorado writer Harrison Candelaria Fletcher was almost 2 years old, his father, a pharmacist, died, leaving behind a wife and five children. His mother, who was 29 years younger than her husband, grew up in a […]
Posted inArticles
Rantcast: Bringing back the mammoths
Rants from the Hill are Michael Branch’s monthly musings on life in rural Nevada. They are posted at the beginning of each month at www.hcn.org. You can subscribe to the podcast for free in iTunes, or through Feedburner if you use other podcast readers. Each month’s rant is also available in written form. Musical credits for Rantcast: Bumper sticker sloganeering, licensed under […]