ARIZONA Since the federal government listed the cactus ferruginous pygmy owl as endangered in 1997, it has been a point of conflict between developers and slow-growth advocates in Tucson (HCN, 8/30/99: A pocket-sized bird takes on Sunbelt subdivisions). Now, a federal district judge has removed some federal protections for the tiny owl’s habitat. In July […]
Pygmy owls lose one in court
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
ESA didn’t kill firefighters
WASHINGTON As flames sped through Okanogan National Forest on July 10, ground dispatchers delayed a helicopter water-drop because they were unsure whether siphoning water from the Chewuch River would violate the Endangered Species Act. That afternoon, four firefighters died (HCN, 7/30/01: Tragedy re-ignites wildfire debate). But an investigative report, released on Sept. 26 by the […]
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
Power plant creates noisy dispute
IDAHO Sparks are flying over a proposed power plant in southeastern Idaho’s rural Canyon County. Ida-West Energy Company says it must build the plant in order to fill a projected deficit in its southern Idaho service area of 250 megawatts by 2004. But first the plant needs a county permit. Ida-West officials say the permit […]
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
Pigs run hog wild in the Olympics
WASHINGTON An unprecedented number of feral pigs are causing a ruckus in a valley near Washington’s Olympic National Park. According to park officials, the pigs have invaded from the nearby Quinault Indian Reservation, where the tribe has hunted the animals for nearly 15 years. Since April, the wild hogs have breached the perimeter of the […]
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
Monument of tall trees will stand
CALIFORNIA In late September, a federal judge in Washington, D.C., rejected a challenge to the newly designated Giant Sequoia National Monument in the southern Sierra Nevada. The monument protects 330,000 acres of forest ecosystem, including nearly half of the world’s remaining giant sequoia groves. Timber and off-highway vehicle groups, as well as Tulare County, where […]
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
The Latest Bounce
Earthjustice is appealing a federal district judge’s decision to revoke Oregon coastal coho salmon’s status as a threatened species. In September, the judge ruled that there is no difference between wild and hatchery-raised coho, and that the combined population no longer merits special protection (HCN, 10/8/01: Coho salmon lose federal protection). The Columbia-Snake River Irrigators […]
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
The Rio Grande’s unsung diplomat
River activist ‘Uncle Steve’ Harris makes waves rather than headlines
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
Heard around the West
Living with wildlife in the West can be a lot like living with a spouse – annoying. Just when you think you’ve figured out how to make the relationship hum, new quirks appear. And since black bears and coyotes can’t talk about it, we have to be canny enough to figure out what’s going wrong […]
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
High Country News: Friend or foe?
Over the past months, High Country News has received a number of letters and e-mails from readers upset about the tone of an article or an opinion expressed in one of the Writers on the Range columns. You’ll find one such letter below from a Bozeman, Mont., reader blasting Writers on the Range for running […]
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
…while another quietly moves ahead
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. ALMA, N.M. – Eight years ago, long before the Forest Service signed the agreement to reduce cattle numbers along rivers in the Gila National Forest, Sewell Goodwin voluntarily pulled his 300 cattle off the San Francisco River. With a little help from the agency, […]
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
One rancher stands in defiance…
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. GLENWOOD, N.M. – It took seven years for environmentalists to get cattle off 230 miles of rivers and streams across the Southwest. It took nearly three more years to get livestock off one mile of river controlled by rancher Hugh B. McKeen. Until late […]
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
A graceful gazelle becomes a pest
The exotic oryx is wearing out its welcome in the Chihuahuan Desert
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
Park boss gored by grazing feud
Four-decade controversy continues in Dinosaur National Monument
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
A monorail for the mountains?
Colorado considers a space-age alternative to asphalt
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
Remembering Mike
One of the country’s statesmen died Oct. 5, 2001, at the age of 98. Mike Mansfield grew up in Great Falls, Mont., and worked in the copper mines of Butte before launching one of the longest and most distinguished political careers in history. It was punctuated by his staunch opposition to the Vietnam War. Below […]
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
Dear Friends
Sympathy from all over It appears that it’s the rare town, city or school that didn’t come up with a creative way to respond to the Sept. 11 attacks in New York and Washington, D.C. Penny drives have been popular in the West, and displays of letters from kids to police and firefighters were shared […]
Posted inOctober 22, 2001: Healing the Gila
Healing the Gila
Three years after the Forest Service booted cows off some Southwestern rivers, the battle over grazing in the desert is still not over
Posted inOctober 8, 2001: Whoa! Canada!
Lessons of an intolerant past
As horrified Americans recover from Sept. 11, 2001, many continue to compare the attack on New York and the Pentagon to the 1941 strike against our military base at Pearl Harbor. But let’s also remember another historically relevant place from the World War II era: A lonely scrap of high desert called Minidoka, Idaho. There, […]
Posted inOctober 8, 2001: Whoa! Canada!
Purchased news costs integrity
Dear HCN, I am a reader with only a single year of experience with your publication. I have learned to enjoy the doom, irritation, pique and hope that your publication brings to my home on a periodic basis. Being a born-and-bred Lexingtonian (“Home of the Revolution,” don’t you know …), my move West opened my […]
Posted inOctober 8, 2001: Whoa! Canada!
No problem for Brad
Dear HCN, In his piece on Brad Powell, the Forest Service’s Regional Forester for California (HCN, 9/10/01: New forest chief becomes a lame duck), Ed Marston makes it sound like Dale Bosworth fired Powell. In fact, Powell is moving to Missoula to become regional forester for the Northern Region (North Idaho, Montana, North Dakota). That’s […]