How a feisty group of government retirees faced down the Bush administration and changed the future of America’s national parks
Old but Faithful
Posted inWotr
Of salvage logging and salvation
Salvage is a word that is much in the air these days, not just in the woods, but also in the lecture halls of universities and in the marble corridors of Washington, D.C. It is a word of power, a soothing word implying many virtues: prudence and profit, rescue and redemption, both exploitation and, somehow, […]
Posted inWotr
Running wild in Yellowstone National Park
In Yellowstone, it’s never unusual for a car to halt smack in the middle of the road. Nor it is unusual for a car’s driver to stand in the road, gawking at wildlife. It is unusual for a driver to be shouting — at me. I was riding my bike on Yellowstone’s northeast entrance road, […]
Posted inWotr
Watching with wonder a parliament of snowyowls
One by one as the afternoon shadows stretched across the winter fields a few miles north of Pablo, in the Flathead Valley of western Montana, the parliament of snowy owls began to fly up to sit on the neighboring fence posts. Along the dirt roads circling the fields, cars were already pulling over and spotting […]
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Scooter blues: When you’re environmentally correct and get no respect
I wish I knew why Harley riders stare straight through me when I’m coming down the street on my scooter from the opposite direction. Sadly, I’m beginning to suspect American motorcyclists of subscribing to a caste system in which Harley Davidsons occupy the top tier, followed by the Euro-touro blends, the bullet bikes, dirt bikes, […]
Posted inWotr
Westerners sure love their mountain monikers
The first thing I noticed when I was plucked from a sound sleep by aliens and we started flying around was that all the Western towns and cities were conveniently labeled. Lifting off from Logan, Utah, I could clearly see the big mountainside “L” get smaller as we zoomed skyward. Heading west, it only took […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
This dog believes
“Each week we’ll hear from a banker or butcher, a painter or social worker as they discuss the principles that guide their daily lives. We realize what a daunting prospect this is — to summarize a life’s philosophy in just 500 words and share it with a national audience. But that’s exactly what we hope […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
Somewhere up the crazy river
Robin Carey’s Upstream: Sons, Fathers and Rivers is a riveting story of river ascent, with a family’s troubled history unfolding along the way. Rob and his son, Dev, former “down river” guides, decide to kayak from the mouth of the Klamath River in California 200 miles up to Oregon’s Klamath Lake. They want to learn […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
Crafting the everyday
Stridently male: That’s how journalist Joseph Kinsey Howard characterized Butte, once the world’s greatest producer of copper. Not only was hardrock mining physically demanding, it was the most dangerous industrial occupation in America. Small wonder that Butte developed a reputation for being a man’s town or that its official history has always been told from […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
An encyclopedia of rivers
Rivers are the “nerve system” of the continent’s ecology, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. reminds us in his foreword to Rivers of North America. As population, industry and agriculture grow, the need for fresh water increases. But meeting that demand often entails the wholesale diverting, damming and draining of rivers. Rivers of North America is the […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
Forestry story lacked context
We were very disturbed by Peter Friederici’s article “Peace Breaks Out in New Mexico’s Forests.” Its misrepresentations and outright lies are a slap in the face to all of us who were involved in trying to revitalize community forestry during the 1990s. Friederici fails to provide any of the historical and cultural context necessary to […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
Roadless Rule provided clear direction
Your article “Clinton-era roadless rule is back … for now” overlooks some key facts about recent developments and threats still facing roadless areas in our national forests. While noting that a Wyoming court enjoined the Roadless Rule, the article failed to mention that a higher court — the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals — strongly […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
Playing God in the woods
I just read your article about how environmental groups are working with loggers to thin forests in New Mexico. While I am not opposed to thinning trees near communities to increase their defensibility against wildfires, I do think we need to examine the assumptions that underlie thinning programs. There is an implicit assumption that large […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
RECA needs revision
As the former medical director of the Navajo Area Radiation Exposure Screening & Education Program (Navajo Area Indian Health Service), I would like to add several points to the generally excellent articles by Laura Paskus, “Navajo Windfall” and “Navajos pay for industry’s mistakes.” Having worked for four years examining patients applying for compensation under the […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
Tender memories
Thank you for Diane Sylvain’s radiant essay, “The Memory of Mountains.” I am weary of wild-wo/man hiker goes solo into wilderness and has a Big Moment. Diane’s tender writing summed up for me the essence of the best of High Country News: the illuminating of the threads that connect us to each other, and to […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
The evils of takings
Thank you so much for your terrific story on the evils of the proposed takings initiatives on the November ballot. I believe your story played a great part in the defeat of California’s Proposition 90. Your eye-opening article got me writing letters to newspapers and telling my friends about it, who told their friends. … […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
Conspiring with caddisflies
“He hath ribbons of all the colours i’ the rainbow; inkles, caddisses, cambrics and lawns.” —from The Winter’s Tale, by William Shakespeare Name Ferg (no first name, no last name, just Ferg) Vocation Father of two, a Renaissance man who draws, paints, sculpts, composes poetry, plays music, and makes jewelry from beetle carcasses. Age 40 […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
Fed up with paying to play
One woman’s dissent could help cripple federal fee program
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
Two weeks in the West
“What are you going to do? They dumped millions on my head.” —Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Calif., on election night, as he realized he would get voted out of office. Democrat Jerry McNerney upset Pombo with the help of an infusion of cash from various environmental groups. Indian Country thaw. The Hopi and Navajo tribes this […]
Posted inNovember 27, 2006: The West: A New Center of Power
Doing something about ‘anything’
As Democrats rode a multidimensional wave of voter anger to congressional dominance last week, I began to worry. After all, I was the new guy in the editor’s chair; I’d barely had time to find my computer, much less write any of the nuanced election analysis you expect from High Country News. Then I relaxed, […]