Yet another new intern Sporting a black beret and a cheery attitude, the paper’s newest intern blew into the High Country Schmooze office last week, fresh from a blizzard of subpoenas and a lively book tour. “All I want to do is buckle down and work real hard,” Moniker Looinsky said, smiling and winking at […]
High Country Schmooze
Posted inMarch 29, 1999: Wheeling and dealing
A muckraker throws a well-aimed wrench
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. In the end, Wyoming’s self-appointed public-lands watchdog wasn’t able to halt the “Big Trails’ land swap atop the Bighorn Mountains. But his one-man battle against the controversial deal changed the way land exchanges are handled in the Cowboy State. The watchdog is John Jolley, […]
Posted inMarch 29, 1999: Wheeling and dealing
Wheeling and dealing
Note: a sidebar article, “A muckraker throws a well-aimed wrench,” accompanies this feature story. WESTON HILLS, Wyo. – Larry Gerard’s blue work shirt whips in the wind as we stand among ponderosa pines on this ridge. To the west, the Bighorn Mountains glitter with spring snow. Just below, rancher Joe Collins is planting wheat. The […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Dangers of exploring abandoned mines
A 24-page workbook about the dangers of exploring abandoned mines is available free to youth groups and educators. Mining Utah’s Heritage includes drawings, games and quizzes to get its message across. For a copy, call Jan Morse at 801/538-5305 or write the Abandoned Mine Reclamation Program, P.O. Box 145801, Salt Lake City, UT 84114-5801. This […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Cyanide Uncertainties: Observations on the Chemistry, Toxicity, and Analysis of Cyanide in Mining Related Waters
The Mineral Policy Center has published a 16-page pamphlet on the hazards of mining with cyanide. For a free copy of Cyanide Uncertainties: Observations on the Chemistry, Toxicity, and Analysis of Cyanide in Mining Related Waters, contact Mineral Policy Center, 1612 K St. NW, Suite 808, Washington, DC 20006, 202/887-1872, or email: mpc-us@msn.com. This article […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Nebraska National Forest
The national forests of Nebraska, South Dakota and Wyoming need volunteers who are passionate about the outdoors and conservation. There are a variety of opportunities, from trail work to answering questions at visitor centers. Contact Nebraska National Forest, 125 N. Main St., Chadron, NE 69337, or www.fs.fed.us/r2/nebraska/volunteer/ index.htm. This article appeared in the print edition […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Spring Action Training Camp
The Cove/Mallard Coalition in Idaho is offering hands-on experience May 26-31 to anyone interested in becoming an in-the-woods activist. Workshops at the Spring Action Training Camp include wilderness survival and the “how to” of successful blockades and tree sits. Call 208/882-9755, write P.O. Box 8968, Moscow, ID 83832 or e-mail cove@moscow.com. This article appeared in […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
A Culture to Sustain Us: Creating a Center that Holds
This year’s Sitka Symposium, featuring writers David Orr, Pattiann Rogers and others, revolves around the theme, “A Culture to Sustain Us: Creating a Center that Holds.” The gathering is set for June 17-23, in Sitka, Alaska. To learn more, contact the Island Institute, P.O. Box 2420, Sitka, AK 99835; 907/747-3794; e-mai;: island@ptialaska.net. This article appeared […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Honoring the Mother, Healing Global Wounds Spring Gathering
Community groups and activists are invited to “break the nuclear chain” at the Nevada Test Site May 7-10. Honoring the Mother, Healing Global Wounds Spring Gathering will include nonviolence training and programs on empowering youth. Contact P.O. Box 420, Tecopa, CA 92389 (760/852-4175), hgw@scruznet.com or www.shundahai.org/HGW for more information. This article appeared in the print […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
22nd International Film Festival
The 22nd International Film Festival in Missoula, Mont., showcases the world’s best wildlife films on April 17-24, beginning with the WildWalk parade, which hoots and howls through downtown Missoula. For more information, contact festival organizers at 27 Fort Missoula Rd. #2, Missoula, MT 59804-7200, 406/728-9380, iwff@wildlifefilms.org, http://www.wildlifefilms.org. This article appeared in the print edition of […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Wirth Chair for Environmental and Community Development Policy
The search is on. The Tim Wirth Chair awards directors are seeking nominations for Wirth Chair for Environmental and Community Development Policy awards, given to individuals, groups and media for work in sustainable development. Nominations are due by April 15. Contact Marshall Kaplan at 303/820-5605, Tom McCoy at 303/820-5628 or write 1445 Market Street, Suite […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
The big picture
-These photos are a stop-gap look at a point in time, a chance to see what the landscape looked like six or 10 years ago.” *Bill DuBois From the pilot’s seat of his 44-year-old Cessna 180 plane, F.E. Bill DuBois has been taking photos of every precious metal mine in Nevada for 24 years. What […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Are salmon bear essentials?
New research shows that the decline of salmon populations in the Northwest has drastically altered the diet of the region’s grizzly bears. Historically, say Charles Robbins of Washington State University and other researchers, salmon accounted for an average of two-thirds of a grizzly’s diet, and, at times, as much as 90 percent. The biologists examined […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Adopt-a-ferret is under way
Once close to extinction, the black-footed ferret is making a comeback this year. Over the past decade, thousands of the critters have been raised in captivity by a federally funded breeding program. This year, scientists plan to release around 250 ferrets in five Western states, adding to the estimated 200 captive-bred ferrets already in the […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Help arrives for the ailing Alamosa
For years, locals have declared Colorado’s Alamosa River “dead,” killed by pollution from the notorious Summitville Mine. Now, a grassroots organization has teamed up with a national group to resurrect the river. The Capulin, Colo.-based Restore Our Alamosa River was selected from 130 applicants to join a national umbrella group, Water Keepers Alliance, that provides […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Here comes a wayward wolf
When the lone gray wolf appeared ahead of a snowplow driver on Highway 7 in the Blue Mountains of northeastern Oregon, it became the state’s first official wild wolf sighting since 1946. Leaving Idaho, the two-year-old female had traveled hundreds of miles over mountains, rivers and highways, looking for a mate, but its days in […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
State senate says voters weren’t very smart
Were Montana voters confused last year when they passed an initiative halting any expanded or new cyanide leach gold mines? Yes, say some state legislators, and not only confused, but wrong. “Just because the people said that is what they wanted, that does not make it right,” said State Sen. Lorents Grosfield of Big Timber. […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Paying for a gold mine
When the Dakota Mining Corp. abandoned its Stibnite gold mine in the rugged mountains of the Payette National Forest last year, it left a mess behind. Shacks were stuffed with barrels brimming with unknown chemicals; it took a bomb squad from Mountain Home Air Force Base to remove one bottle of particularly volatile acid. Almost […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
The Wayward West
Missing: more than 600 boxes of documents from the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory in southern Idaho (HCN, 9/29/97). Federal scientists studying the effects of the laboratory’s underground radioactive storage facility on downwinders fear the boxes were lost or destroyed by past INEEL employees; they say that at least 60 of the boxes may […]
Posted inMarch 15, 1999: Selling off the Promised Land
Toxic cleanup turns up frogs
During a routine survey of a toxic-waste dump near Santa Maria, Calif., EPA staffers stumbled upon a peculiar surprise. Hiding in the vegetation surrounding a series of rain-filled ponds were an estimated 300 red-legged frogs, a species listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. While the discovery was welcome news, biologists now worry that […]