I see my 19-year-old self in our new intern, as she builds her skills and learns the ropes of ranch etiquette.
New Mexico
Posted inMay 16, 2016: Grizzly Face-Off
Who’s cutting illegal ski trails in the Santa Fe National Forest?
On the trail of a backcountry criminal with the Forest Service.
Posted inArticles
Why I’m fighting foreign garlic growers and their U.S. allies
Our little New Mexico garlic patch is raising hell in law firms and government offices.
Posted inArticles
Can food hubs boost rural farming economies?
The Department of Agriculture is funding new initiatives to streamline local food systems.
Posted inArticles
Pain pill addiction has helped precipitate a rise in heroin abuse West-wide
Near Sacramento, California, nearly a dozen people died from opioids in recent weeks.
Posted inMarch 21, 2016: Making Sense of Malheur
Latest: WIPP nuclear waste spill investigation concludes
Workers incorrectly packaged waste shipped to the facility, whose future remains unclear.
Posted inMarch 7, 2016: The Parks You Don't Know
At Valles Caldera, a new national park unit takes shape
A preserve was added to the park system, after an experiment in managing federal lands outside the traditional agencies.
Posted inFebruary 22, 2016: Fractured
Latest: New Mexico land deal opens wilderness access
The Sabinoso Wilderness Area was impossible to access for years, thanks to private landowners.
Posted inFebruary 2, 2016: Sagebrush Insurgency
Past and present in a New Mexico town famous for its pies
A review of “Pie Town Revisited” by Arthur Drooker.
Posted inArticles
Ranch Diaries: How to apply holistic livestock management to life goals
Abiding by shared values helps our quality of life.
Posted inArticles
Where private land meets public interest
A group of landowners on the Colorado-New Mexico border aim to conserve a contested landscape.
Posted inArticles
In Idaho, rancher buyouts take a big step forward
Idaho’s White Cloud Mountains seem like an unlikely place for the beginning of a positive shift in public-land management. They gleam high and cold above the seemingly endless sagebrush plains of southern Idaho, one of the most conservative states in the West. Yet it was here last year that Republicans worked with environmentalists to plant […]
Posted inArticles
Ranch Diaries: Year in review at Triangle P
Coconut the elk, Clem the colt and big dreams for next year.
Posted inDecember 21, 2015: Secrets of the Deep
The story behind a saved cienega in New Mexico
A rancher fights to protect a restored wetland against torrential rain and other threats.
Posted inDecember 21, 2015: Secrets of the Deep
Latest: Gila River diversion inches forward
The project will start environment reviews, but it’s far from a done deal.
Posted inDecember 21, 2015: Secrets of the Deep
Why Westerners die at the hands of cops
Jack Yantis, an Idaho rancher, raised the profile of rural police brutality.
Posted inDecember 7, 2015: Good Neighbors
Gun-toting toddlers in the desert and drunk Brits in the Grand Canyon
Mishaps and mayhem from around the region.
Posted inOctober 26, 2015: Clean Energy's Dirty Secret
The Latest: Park Service takes the reins at Valles Caldera
The failed experiment in privatized land management has come to an end.
Posted inArticles
Mexican wolves seem targeted for extinction
This fall, for the second time, the New Mexico Game and Fish Commission rejected a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposal to release two adult Mexican wolves with pups, and up to 10 captive-born wolf pups, into the Mexican Wolf Recovery Area in southern Arizona and New Mexico. An important part of the release, which […]
Posted inArticles
Mexican wolf restoration hits (another) snag
The feds want to release captive animals to increase genetic diversity in the wild, but New Mexico isn’t having it.