UTAH After President Clinton used the Antiquities Act to establish Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in 1996, Gov. Mike Leavitt railed against the move as an abuse of executive power. But during his State of the State address this Jan. 28, Leavitt asked President Bush for something that made environmentalists’ jaws hit the floor: a 620,000-acre […]
Groundswell for a monument?
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Entrepreneur shovels trouble
UTAH Archaeologists don’t dig Anasazi Digs. The family-owned business on private land near Monticello, Utah, invites customers to excavate – and keep – artifacts from an Anasazi pueblo for $2,500 a day. “It’s like owning a Van Gogh painting and cutting it into lots of pieces,” says Utah state archaeologist Kevin Jones. “The owner could […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Dunes shifts toward park status
COLORADO Rural communities often cringe at the prospect of the federal government owning more land. But residents in Colorado’s San Luis Valley are breathing a sigh of relief now that their valley is one step closer to becoming home to a new national park. In January, The Nature Conservancy signed an agreement to buy a […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Moose-slinging ends
UTAH Utah’s emergency program to relocate moose by air has been grounded. A heavy early snowfall brought a larger than usual number of moose down close to Interstate 80 in search of food, and drivers struck and killed seven of the animals in December alone. These accidents, combined with an anticipated increase in traffic during […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Buyout for bears
IDAHO Everybody knows that sheep and grizzlies just don’t get along. The predator-prey antagonism has been especially acute in Idaho’s Targhee National Forest, where five grizzlies were relocated and 34 domestic sheep killed from 1996 to 1998. One sheep herder suffered a grizzly mauling. But bear-sheep conflicts on the Targhee promise to diminish in the […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Scouts (dis)honor
ARIZONA After Henry Jackson bought the X9 ranch just a few miles southeast of land-hungry Tucson in 1955, he subdivided and lightly developed much of it. But during the ’70s and ’80s, Jackson also deeded 420 acres to the Boy Scouts of America. At the base of the Rincon Mountains, the land is bordered by […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
The Latest Bounce
All sides are hailing the negotiated settlement of a lawsuit challenging the Forest Service’s salvage logging plan for Montana’s burned Bitterroot National Forest (HCN, 1/21/02: Judge puts kibosh on logging plan). On Feb. 7, environmental groups, the logging industry and Bush administration officials announced a revised plan that removes 27,000 acres of sensitive roadless lands […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Cheney picks former aide to oversee parks, BLM,wildlife
When Paul Hoffman went hunting in Wyoming’s Absaroka Mountains last fall, he shot a six-point bull elk. Then he cut it into steaks and burgers for his family to eat. Now he plans to take the stuffed head and antlers to Washington, D.C., to decorate his new office. “I think that’s one reason they picked […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
The Eucalyptus: Sacred or profane?
Only God can make a tree, but any ecological illiterate can plant it in the wrong place. Ansel Adams understood this. On running tree-planting Boy Scouts out of California’s Marin Headlands, the photographer declared: “I cannot think of a more tasteless undertaking than to plant trees in a naturally treeless area, and to impose an […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Heard around the West
Once in a while, Utah makes us wonder. Guns, for instance, enjoy a privileged status that extends everywhere on Beehive State property except prisons, hospitals and courtrooms. That means you can wear a .40-caliber Glock pistol while teaching or taking notes in a college classroom, and nobody has the right to ask you to leave […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Greens join ‘Let’s derail a judge’ game
Federal judges around the West have often been the backstop protecting everything environmental, from stream quality to spotted owls. So it’s surprising when green groups say some judges are systematically undercutting their work. But some “highly ideological and activist judges are threatening the very core of environmental law,” warns a campaign by a dozen groups, […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Attention, wolves: I’m what’s for dinner
Like many Western states before it, Colorado is considering a plan to bring the wolf back to its former turf in the Centennial State. Among the general public, support for the plan is significant: A study by a Washington, D.C., polling firm found that 68 percent of Coloradans asked were in favor of putting wolves […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
How does snow melt? A test for all Westerners
“You can’t be a sissy and live in this country,” the old rancher told me, his German accent evident despite his being native to this mountain valley. “Or at least you didn’t use to,” he added, looking me in the eye. It was the 1970s, and I was new to the Interior West. The rancher […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Running for cover on the Rio Grande
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. LOWER RIO GRANDE VALLEY, Texas – Spanish explorers who came here in the 16th century found a jungle of cedar elm and sugar hackberry hung with moss. They called the river Rio de las Palmas, the River of Palms, because of the sabal palm […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
What is poisoning border babies?
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. BROWNSVILLE, Texas – In April 1991, health care workers in this border town were brought up short. In a matter of hours, three babies were born at the Community Health Clinic with anencephaly, a rare birth defect marked by the failure of the fetus […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
A river on the line
A trip through the U.S.-Mexico borderlands reveals a tough road ahead for the Rio Grande
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Will bulldozers roll into Arizona’s Eden?
Rancher’s wilderness inholding caught in a decade-long feud
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Battle brews over a wilderness mother lode
Activists say Montana’s Rock Creek Mine would harm grizzly, bull trout and clean water
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Condor program laden with lead
Carcass-feeding condors dying from bullets
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Predator politics gets ugly in Idaho
Fish and Game Director Rod Sando quits