The state of Colorado is looking for “volunteer stewards” to be its eyes and ears in the field. The state’s Natural Areas Program asks stewards to visit areas such as the alpine meadows surrounding Gothic, Colo., and the desert Escalante Canyon, and report back on what they find. You’ll need a good pair of hiking […]
Volunteer Stewards
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
National Mountain Conference
Hiking and mountaineering clubs will sponsor a National Mountain Conference in Golden, Colo., Sept. 14-16. Land managers and outdoor recreation specialists will discuss human impacts on mountain ecosystems, and a field trip to ski area expansions at Vail Pass and Breckenridge is also available. Call conference coordinator at 603/466-2721, ext. 184, send e-mail to melhov@landmarknet.net, […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Riparian Ecology and Management in Multi-Land Use Watersheds
A conference on Riparian Ecology and Management in Multi-Land Use Watersheds Aug. 28-31 in Portland, Ore., includes international speakers who will discuss issues from salmon recovery to the effects of earthquakes on riverside habitat. Contact the American Water Resources Association at 4 West Federal St., P.O. Box 1626, Middleburg, VA 20118-1626 (540/687-8390), www.awra.org. This article […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Sacred Buffalo Conference
Seven Pueblo tribes will host the third annual Sacred Buffalo Conference, Aug. 13-15 in Santa Fe, N.M. The theme is “Restoring Healthy Native Nations,” and participants will discuss topics ranging from buffalo herd management to diabetes in Indian people. Contact the InterTribal Bison Cooperative at 1560 Concourse Drive, Rapid City, SD 57703 (605/394-9730), www.intertribalbison.org. This […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Raging river, quiet mind
Field Notes from the Grand Canyon: Raging River, Quiet Mind, by Teresa Jordan, Johnson Books, 1880 S. 57th Court, Boulder, CO 80301, 2000. Paperback: $14. “There is a Zen saying that when the student is ready, the teacher is there,” writes Teresa Jordan, who had carried her watercolors on a dozen different trips, never to […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Killing Coyote
The human hordes are still at it, roaming the last of the Big Open with their guns and traps and poisons, trying to wipe out yet another of their fellow creatures. This time, the target is the resilient trickster himself, coyote. Doug Hawes-Davis frames his latest documentary film, Killing Coyote, with the Calcutta, a coyote-killing […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Vulgar yet valiant
For most of us, a quick glimpse of a plane as it drones overhead on its way to a wildfire is all we’ll ever see of smokejumpers or the work they do, but Murry A. Taylor’s Jumping Fire: A Smokejumper’s Memoir of Fighting Wildfire in the West, offers insight into their hectic lives. Taylor, who […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
The bees’ needs
Golf courses are becoming a great place to learn about the birds and the bees. A Portland, Ore.-based group says that with a little encouragement, native pollinators such as bees and beetles will easily inhabit golf courses. Only a small percentage of any golf course is used by golfers, and the rest has great potential […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Saving some of Utah
In early June, a coalition of environmental groups completed a three-year, $2.5 million fund-raising effort to protect a historic ranch tucked deep in northern Utah’s Wasatch Mountains. The privately owned ranch provides habitat for elk, mule deer, moose and sandhill cranes, and several historic trails traverse the ranch’s 7,300 acres. But the property is only […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Help search for snakes
Hikers, bikers and river rafters should be ready to capture – with cameras, that is – any scaly-skinned critters sunning themselves on Grand Canyon rocks. Nikolle Brown, also known as “the Snake Lady,” needs help documenting reptile sightings for her Snakes of the Grand Canyon Identification and Distribution project. Brown, a seasoned wildlife biologist for […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Barberry bush beats bacteria
A compound from a barberry bush found on Colorado’s Western Slope is helping researchers fight antibiotic resistance. Some bacteria, particularly those that cause staph infections, can become resistant to antibiotics by pumping the drug out of cells before it begins to work. Colorado State University professor Frank Stermitz and Tufts University professor Kim Lewis discovered […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
One big bighorn
The biggest bighorn sheep skull you’ve ever seen is on display this summer at the National Bighorn Sheep Interpretive Center in Dubois, Wyo. It was found in the 1970s, among the remains of camels, cheetahs, musk ox, short-faced bears and bison that fell thousands of years ago into an 80-foot-deep limestone cave in Wyoming’s Bighorn […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
In New Mexico, a surprising proposal rises from the flames
For 11 years, Santa Fe’s Forest Guardians have been unflinching in their opposition to logging on the Southwest’s national forests. But this June, they blinked. Following the Cerro Grande fire that swept through Los Alamos, Forest Guardians released its first-ever proposal for cutting trees. The proposal calls for thinning and prescribed burning in Santa Fe’s […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Loggers win one
WASHINGTON A county jury says the state of Washington must pay a logging company almost $10,000 an acre if it wants to protect spotted owls on private land. SDS Co. was forced to halt logging on 232 acres of its land in 1992 after state biologists found evidence of an owl nest in the area. […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Neighbors oppose land trade
COLORADO A 640-acre piece of high-elevation forest and meadowland is the topic of a heated debate in central Colorado. The future of the Little Cochetopa Creek School Section near Salida is now in the hands of the State Land Board, and Chaffee County residents worry the board will choose private development over public domain. A […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Water district has identity crisis
NEW MEXICO The largest irrigation district on the Rio Grande has received some bone-shaking news: The Middle Rio Grande Conservancy District, formerly thought to be an arm of the state, is a federal agency. In 1951, the Bureau of Reclamation bailed out the nearly bankrupt district, spending millions to renovate dams and irrigation ditches. At […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Buddhist temple hits a snag
CALIFORNIA While a Buddhist temple may be a place of tranquility, plans for a new retreat center in a canyon have environmentalists fuming and suing. The controversy began after San Bernardino County unanimously approved a 1998 proposal by Ling Yen Temple Inc. to build a 10-building retreat and a 600-car parking lot. Now, a Pasadena-based […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Government writes wolf success story
NATION The federal government has declared its wolf recovery program a success. With wolf numbers at nearly 3,500 today – up from practically zero in the 1950s – the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed on July 11 to downlist the gray wolf from “endangered” to “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act in most of […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
The Wayward West
The Clinton administration has weighed in on the politically charged dam-breaching debate in the Northwest – and some say it’s bad news for endangered salmon (HCN, 12/20/99: Unleashing the Snake). On July 19, George Frampton, chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality, announced Clinton will delay demolishing the four Snake River dams for five to […]
Posted inJuly 31, 2000: Out of the darkness
Colorado blazes fuel forest restoration efforts
Front Range communities work to protect their water supply from post-fire soil erosion