YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Mont. – Like millions of other Americans tuned to the nightly news, rancher Delas Munns has watched in disgust as the death toll of Yellowstone bison climbs. The images of bloody gut piles and docile behemoths corralled and shipped to slaughterhouses like cattle do not make him happy. Munns and his five […]
Recreation
Posted inFebruary 17, 1997: No home on the range
For bison, it’s deja vu all over again
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyo. – For the bison here in the world’s oldest national park, roundups and slaughterhouses are nothing new. At times, park managers tried to foster the bison herds. At other times, they killed them by the hundreds. Until the early 1950s, […]
Posted inFebruary 17, 1997: No home on the range
Federal agency was careless with a live vaccine
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Conservationists, animal rights groups and Park Service officials have long been wary of the federal agency that has ordered the slaughter of Yellowstone bison. Recently, they have uncovered evidence that gives some credence to their fears. Internal documents obtained by High Country News suggest […]
Posted inFebruary 17, 1997: No home on the range
‘Humane is what’s best for humans’
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. This winter has been especially busy for Yellowstone National Park photographer Jim Peaco: Jim Peaco: “I photographed a Park Service roundup where rangers on horseback were trying to move bison back into Yellowstone Park. It can be a little scary to watch. These are […]
Posted inFebruary 17, 1997: No home on the range
To the south, bison and cattle coexist
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. JACKSON, Wyo. – South of Yellowstone National Park near the Grand Tetons, cattle have grazed “nose-to-nose” with brucellosis-infected bison and elk for more than 75 years. How is it that this herd of nearly 300 bison that roams from Grand Teton National Park to […]
Posted inFebruary 3, 1997: Bringing back the bighorn
Build it, and folks will come
We came and went like the storms that passed over our heads, living at 11,300 feet in the Gore Range above Vail, Colo., where we raced against “old man winter” to build a log hut for the Tenth Mountain Division. Four of us lived in a tepee for five months while we labored, working too […]
Posted inFebruary 3, 1997: Bringing back the bighorn
Grizzlies and tourism collide on Wyoming road
CODY, Wyo. – They razed the best patch of angelica. The nondescript low forb is a favored food for grizzly bears along the highway corridor from Cody to the west entrance to Yellowstone National Park. The North Fork Highway, as U.S. 14-16-20 is called, was once described by Theodore Roosevelt as one of the most […]
Posted inJanuary 20, 1997: Bees under siege
Money can’t buy a full season
Even though higher entrance fees in Yellowstone National Park are expected to raise roughly $7 million over the next three years, more money won’t guarantee that the park will stay open for its traditional season. That’s because Park Service officials in Washington determined that maintenance for deteriorating roads and buildings should be top priority for […]
Posted inJanuary 20, 1997: Bees under siege
Silence wins in Colorado
Those who felt that the new rules governing flights over the Grand Canyon were too lenient now have something to cheer: On Jan. 3, the Federal Aviation Adminstration issued a separate rule banning all commercial flights over Colorado’s Rocky Mountain National Park. “This is fabulous news to bring in the New Year,” said Colorado Rep. […]
Posted inJanuary 20, 1997: Bees under siege
Grand Canyon rafting fees inflate
For many rafters, it doesn’t get any better than a float trip down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. Would-be boaters often spend as long as 10 years waiting for one of 200 private launch dates granted each year. A new fee increase at Grand Canyon National Park may give them second thoughts: an […]
Posted inJanuary 20, 1997: Bees under siege
It will be noise as usual in Grand Canyon
You would never know it from the glowing news reports, but the Federal Aviation Administration has scuttled most of its plans for restricting aircraft overflights in Grand Canyon National Park. Three of the four new “flight-free zones’ the agency proposed in July (HCN, 9/16/96) have been effectively deleted in new rules released Dec. 31. Marble […]
Posted inJanuary 20, 1997: Bees under siege
Horses, bikes push into petroglyph park
On a windswept mesa west of Albuquerque, N.M., bicyclists and horses soon may be pounding the turf where Indians say the spirits of the dead like to travel. The National Park Service is about to approve a new management plan that calls for the development of 11 to 16 miles of trails in the 7,000-acre […]
Posted inDecember 23, 1996: El Nuevo West
Parks want “drug-free’ river guides
The job description for a professional river guide might read like this: Must possess John Wesley Powell’s fearlessness, Julia Child’s culinary skills and the patience of Job. Now, add another requirement: Must pass a drug test. Periodic drug testing began this past season for outfitters licensed in Grand Canyon National Park and may soon be […]
Posted inDecember 23, 1996: El Nuevo West
Profound noise reigns
Three decades ago, says musician Paul Winter, solitude was easy to find in and around Grand Canyon. Some of his award-winning recordings feature wind, ravens and other natural sounds from the national park. Not these days. When Winter and guide Fran Joseph of the Grand Canyon Trust went to a spot this fall where the […]
Posted inDecember 23, 1996: El Nuevo West
Wildlife plan teams with controversy
WASHINGTON, D.C. – About a decade ago, wildlife officials in Idaho began to realize that there were more wolverines in the Sawtooth Mountain area than they had thought. How many more and how should they be managed? Well, that would take some study, which costs money. And as is the case in many states, Idaho’s […]
Posted inDecember 9, 1996: Motorheads: The new, noisy, organized force in the West
Trying to think the good thoughts about ATVs
An elk hunter dislikes ORVs despite their convenience because they make the country too small.
Posted inDecember 9, 1996: Motorheads: The new, noisy, organized force in the West
Motorheads: The new, noisy, organized force in the West
If off-road vehicle enthusiasts ever build a museum, a statue of former Idaho Gov. John Evans should stand out front, a scowl on his face, and his now-famous saying – “You’re politically insignificant” – on the statue’s pedestal. Evans made that remark in 1984 to Clark Collins, an electrician and avid dirt biker who wanted […]
Posted inDecember 9, 1996: Motorheads: The new, noisy, organized force in the West
Can Madison Avenue tread lightly in the West?
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Two men bludgeon a parked Land Rover with sledgehammers. They’re swinging as hard as they can, yet they barely make a dent. This is what Kirk Kirssin of Tread Lightly! considers a responsible television ad. Land Rover didn’t have to show a truck blazing […]
Posted inNovember 25, 1996: Pollution in paradise
The “tough love’ trial is over
After Arizona teenager Aaron Bacon died of perforated ulcers on a wilderness program for wayward teens two years ago, eight North Star employees were charged with felony neglect and abuse of a disabled child (HCN, 6/10/96). Now their trials are over, and only Bacon’s field instructor, 22-year-old Craig Fisher, is guilty as charged. Although Fisher […]
Posted inNovember 11, 1996: Cease-fire called on the Animas-La Plata front
Through Hells and high water
Jetboats will be banned for 21 days each summer on a 21-mile stretch of the Snake River through Hells Canyon, according to a Forest Service plan that’s been a decade in the making. Environmentalists and recreationists who float the river between Idaho and Oregon praised the restriction as a long-overdue first step toward returning quiet […]