After generations of struggle, the Western Shoshone decide in a divisive election to accept land settlement payments from the federal government in lieu of the tribe’s ancestral lands, which one spanned the Great Basin.
The Latest Bounce
It’s lights-out for two Idaho power plants that would have tapped the sole source of drinking water for more than 400,000 people in northern Idaho and eastern Washington (HCN, 4/15/02: Water threat inspires a rare alliance). The proposed plants would have pumped 3.8 billion gallons of water out of the aquifer each year and evaporated…
Nature is never the enemy
Dear HCN, I read with interest and growing dismay your recent article by Ed Marston, “Restoring the West, goat by goat” (HCN, 6/24/02: Restoring the West, goat by goat). The foreign invader that is actually sucking our landscape dry is Western civilization. Tamarisk is a rugged survivor, living on land where the native species have…
It’s the dog days for prairie dogs
The West’s prairie dog populations are in bad shape. Of the five species in the West, two are already on the endangered species list, while a third is a candidate for listing (HCN, 2/1/99: Ranchers don’t want refugee prairie dogs). No one has been looking out for the white-tailed prairie dog – until now. In…
Lewis and Clark revisited
Ever wanted to hear the unauthorized version of the Lewis and Clark expedition? Listen to stories that have been passed down through generations of Indian tribes at the Save Our Wild Salmon Coalition’s commemoration of the Lewis and Clark bicentennial. The Aug. 15-16 gathering will examine the link between salmon, tribes and the expedition, and…
A kick in the grass for restoration
Looking back on the disastrous wildfires of 1999 and facing a devastating future in the Great Basin, the Bureau of Land Management saw an opportunity to try a holistic restoration effort that would break the cheatgrass-induced fire cycle (HCN, 5/22/00: Save Our Sagebrush). This landscape-sized idea spawned the Eastern Nevada Landscape Coalition, a nonprofit partnership…
Utah gases up
Major oil and gas development is one step closer to fruition on 2 million acres of public land in northeastern Utah. Geophysical surveying company Veritas DGC Inc. recently submitted a draft environmental assessment, proposing two-dimensional seismic exploration in the Book Cliffs area. Instead of using behemoth thumper trucks, Veritas plans to detonate 7,500 underground explosives…
When good tax-evaders go bad
Back in the halcyon days of the Northwest militia movement in the mid-’90s, a curious breed of man emerged from the moist backwoods and unemployment lines of the disenfranchised West: the wannabe Patriot. In Whatcom County, Wash., the commander in chief of the Washington State Militia, John Pitner, was experiencing New World Order visions. The…
She left the ranch to save her soul
Picturesque and nostalgic as the pioneer era might seem in hindsight, to be a prairie woman must have been, on most days, pure hell. But that story is sometimes absent from the pioneer literary history, a genre written largely by white men, about white men. Until now. If you continue west from the stage for…
Sound science or red tape?
A proposed amendment to the Endangered Species Act could weaken the roles of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service in deciding which species do – or do not – get federal protection. Since the Act was passed in 1973, the two agencies have been responsible for listing species and…
L.A.’s rivers get some respect
CALIFORNIA A new proposal could someday turn the lower Los Angeles River and the San Gabriel River – now little more than concrete-lined ditches – into one of the nation’s few urban national parks. In June, the U.S. Department of the Interior gave a tentative thumbs-up to a bill from U.S. Rep. Hilda Solis, D-Calif.,…
Yucca heads for the courts
NEVADA With the Senate’s 60-39 approval of a nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain on July 9, the congressional fight over what to do with the nation’s spent nuclear fuel is finished. President Bush signed the bill into law July 23. But Nevada officials and politicians say that an array of legal and procedural hurdles…
Take a lesson on methane
Dear HCN, Keep up the battle against the methane drillers (HCN, 5/27/02: Dear Friends). We in Las Animas County, Colo., have seen the impact of this industry on our environment and it is not pleasant. Our mountain water wells have gone dry, our local county and state roads are falling apart due to the heavy…
Wasting disease sneaks south
NEW MEXICO Chronic wasting disease has reared its head in southern New Mexico, 600 miles from any previously known outbreaks. In June, an emaciated mule deer discovered at White Sands Missile Range tested positive for the disease. The state’s Department of Game and Fish was taken off guard by the discovery. Since 1999, officials have…
Don’t ignore climate change
Dear HCN, I read the issue on fire with great interest (HCN, 7/8/02: The anatomy of fire). As have so many in the West, I have mourned all that we have lost and all that we are likely to lose in the coming months and years. But I have not seen in HCN, or elsewhere,…
Who speaks for the farmers?
OREGON Some farmers in the Klamath Basin are interested in selling their land to federal agencies and thereby freeing up water, not only for endangered fish, but also for their neighbors – although you wouldn’t know it from listening to their elected officials. This spring, the Klamath Water Users Association helped kill an amendment to…
Norton undermines religious freedom
Dear HCN, The recent decision by the Department of the Interior to approve the Fence Lake coal mine is at the very least a travesty (HCN, 6/24/02: The Latest Bounce). To put a place of such spiritual importance on the chopping block in order to meet the selfish, short-term needs of Phoenix stands as yet…
River town gets into fish business
You’ve heard of Rocky Mountain oyesters — how about Yellowstone Caviar?
Heard around the West
Yes, at first mention it seems bizarre, but it really makes perfect sense: CPR for wild salmon. Fish resuscitation is now a federal- and state-required skill for anglers who cast “tangle nets” on the Columbia River in spring. Chinook salmon can exhaust themselves to the point of death fighting the nets, and if tossed overboard…
Land plan attracts an anti-grazing gorilla
Plan would put 1.7 million acres in hands of local trust
Don’t proclaim the West is dead until you’ve met a Mexican motorcyclist with a wooden leg
My dirty little secret? The one boyfriends can’t tolerate, the one my mother doesn’t know about, the one true friends accept but don’t approve of? When I’m upset, I drive and drink. Well, sort of. Though it’s not what it sounds like, it’s probably not the recommended way for a young woman to cope with…
N.D. court ruling rescinds tribal authority
Decision paves the way for dam construction on sacred burial ground
Land or money?
ELKO, Nev. – A panicked starling flaps under the rafters and the Beastie Boys shout from the overhead loudspeakers, but the tribal gymnasium seems as still and serious as a classroom before a final exam. On the edge of the basketball court, a young woman stands at a folding table, resting her forearms on an…
Dear Friends
A historic, if confusing, moment The residents of Western Colorado’s Delta County, home of High Country News, had been on the edge of their seats for weeks. All eyes were on our three county commissioners, who, on Monday, July 22, would vote whether or not to allow Gunnison Energy Co. to explore for coalbed methane…
Can money buy happiness?
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Nearly every tribe in the United States has been affected by the decisions of the Indian Claims Commission. The commission, and the claims court that took over its caseload when it shut its doors in 1979, heard more than 600 cases and paid out…
Another way to win back land
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. LEE, Nev. – South of Elko, on the west side of the Ruby Mountains, the shady meadows of the South Fork Reservation are thick with irises. Here, Raymond Yowell, who was appointed chief of the Western Shoshone in 1985 by the members of the…
Montana’s governor is a poor choice to lead the West
The Western Governors Association, one of the region’s leading political organizations, has earned a reputation for trying to take a moderate approach to divisive issues. Governors of 18 Western states and three Pacific islands have met regularly for years to devise regional policies on wildfire, energy development and other issues, such as environmental protection. They’re…