Loathed by government officials, recreationists and environmentalists alike, Colorado developer Tom Chapman is at it again. His latest deal exemplifies his typical modus operandi: buy inholdings in remote backcountry, threaten to develop them, and get big payouts from federal agencies desperate to protect pristine public lands. Now he’s purchased 103 acres of mining claims in […]
Public lands “blackmailer” returns
Posted inApril 12, 2010: The Butterfly Sting
March Madness in Indian Country
Wyoming Indian High School dominates the basketball court
Posted inGoat
Voyage of the Plastiki
Two weeks have passed since 12,000 plastic bottles began riding the waves from San Francisco to Sydney. This is no mini Pacific Garbage Patch–the bottles form the bulk of the Plastiki, a 60-foot sailing boat built from recycled materials. Its big, flashy journey is intended to raise awareness about manmade pollution in the ocean. Perhaps […]
Posted inGoat
Big cats come and go
In early March, a mountain lion chased a Jack Russell terrier into a house near Salida, Colo., surprising a woman and her five-year-old son, who sat coloring with crayons at the kitchen table. Luckily, they were able to dash into a bedroom. When Division of Wildlife officials arrived and subdued the lion, they found the […]
Posted inBlog
Un-stimulated
It didn’t take a recession to bring hard times to California’s San Joaquin Valley. Consider these sobering statistics courtesy of the California Partnership for the San Joaquin Valley, a group convened by the governor in 2005 to bring the Valley’s limping economy up to speed: *Average per capita incomes are 32.2 percent lower than the […]
Posted inWotr
A devotee of a new kind of retail therapy
My daughter and I found the perfect sofa on the way to school today. It was just the size and color I was looking to add to the living room. Unfortunately, someone had dumped it upside down in the mud of my neighbor’s front yard. Apparently it took too much energy to have a garage […]
Posted inGoat
Not so CX-y now
A 2008 lawsuit filed to protect Utah petroglyphs from oil and gas drilling has just been resolved — and the settlement has big implications for the West’s public lands. Announced Wednesday, the decision means that the Bureau of Land Management can no longer fast-track energy development in cases where there are “extraordinary circumstances” — environmental, […]
Posted inRange
Hunting season may be over but wolves are hardly in the clear
Yesterday marked the close of the first official hunting season for wolves ever to take place in America’s lower 48 states. More than 250 wolves were killed as a result of Montana and Idaho’s hunting seasons and more than twice that number have been killed overall since wolves lost federal protections in May of 2009. […]
Posted inWotr
Oregon halts corporate affluenza
Tea Party activists across the country probably shuddered with horror when they read what Oregonians did at the polls recently. But for a majority of us who live in this state of rain, big trees and mighty rivers, voting for new taxes during an economic downturn was common sense. For the first time since 1930, […]
Posted inGoat
How much carbon is “In My Tree”?
The grunge band Pearl Jam is known for being loud — and for being socially and environmentally conscious. The rockers deserve more applause this week, after announcing they will mitigate their emissions for their 2009 tour, one tree at a time. The band’s giving $210,000 to the Cascade Land Conservancy to help restore urban forests […]
Posted inWotr
Mountain towns and the persistence of the weird
Chicken-picken’s no more, but skitching thrives
Posted inGoat
If all else fails …
The Forest Service announced this week that it’s taking a bold new tack in forest planning — talking to the public. The agency has been trying for more than a decade to modernize its forest planning process, which is supposed to guide the creation of plans for each national forest that specify areas for logging, […]
Posted inWotr
Between the grims and the grins
Do you believe in technology? I sure do. I came of age when electric typewriters were somewhat novel, a telephone call to a town only 10 miles away was long distance and a 30-volume set of World Britannica represented an exhaustive knowledge base. How quaint. But will technology enable us to stop polluting the atmosphere […]
Posted inBlog
Open space justice
Last week was Spring Break. While I can no longer afford to take the entire week off from work, I could not let the week pass without some time for myself away from the classroom and clinic. Luckily, I was able to spend three amazing days backpacking in the Superstition Mountains, about an hour outside […]
Posted inBlog
Readers wield their fiery pens
High Country News readers have always been an opinionated bunch. You weigh in on whether you agree or disagree with what’s been reported, provide unique perspectives and often set us straight with additional facts and details about complicated issues. For 40 years, your letters have encouraged and inspired the staff, connected the far-flung community of […]
Posted inGoat
Grasshopper plague expected this summer
Fires, floods, drought, blizzards, avalanches — life in the West can be rather challenging. And now a plague of locusts. Well, not exactly. Just plain old grasshoppers, whose population has been growing in parts of the West, and might peak this year, causing hundreds millions of dollars in crop and other damage. The population boom […]
Posted inArticles
Gary Nabhan remembers Stewart Udall
Former Interior Secretary known for vision, decency and conservation.
Posted inRange
HCN Reader Photo: Spring blooms
We asked readers to add images of spring to our Flickr pool, and you graciously obliged. This picture, from user lenfwilcox, is of an aprium blossom in Fresno, California. Aprium, we understand, is a cross between an apricot and a plum. It sounds delicious and looks delightful! Continue sharing your images with us on Flickr; […]
Posted inGoat
Frack-O-Rama
It’s been a hot week in the tug-of-war over how – or whether – the government will regulate hydraulic fracturing (or “fracking”), the drilling method used to extract oil and natural gas, with almost daily headlines coming out of the EPA, Wyoming and Congress. First, the big news: last Thursday, the EPA finally announced it […]