In New Mexico, some wildlife outranks others, with mountain lions landing near the bottom of the pack. It’s not much of an exaggeration to say that the solitary Puma concolor enjoys the status of rats or “trash fish” — which is how New Mexico’s wildlife department characterizes carp. Late last month, the New Mexico Game and […]
Frank Carroll
Posted inWotr
Reflections on the fire that killed 19 firefighters a year ago
The terms fire control and fire management are really just euphemisms for firefighting. Think tornado control or the impossibility of tornado management. We can prepare for fires, we can study them and even learn how to dance with them, but controlling fires is always a gamble. And sometimes we lose. Last year, on June 30, we […]
Posted inWotr
A future of big fires and tiny bugs
My dad was a Forest Service ranger, one of the battle-hardened generation just stepping back into real life from World War II. Rangers like him moved to tiny little towns like Luna, N.M., and Custer, S.D., to work 24-hour days, and their wives were often their chief assistants and sometimes even served as firefighters. The […]
Posted inWotr
A Christmas tradition pueblo-style
At age 79, Vidal Aragon is moving strongly into his second century as perhaps the premier silver smith in the 12 pueblos of the Rio Grande in New Mexico. He signs his jewelry with the bear paw and “VA” merged together. His name commands top prices with the Santa Fe trade. He doesn’t have to […]
Posted inSeptember 25, 2000: Backyard boom
Pick up an ax
Dear HCN, Joy Belsky, a staffer for the Oregon Natural Desert Association, wrote a thoughtful letter about matters of the imagination in the form of a critique of my essay, “Los Alamos is burning” (HCN, 5/22/00: ‘Los Alamos is burning’). By way of reply let me suggest that we don’t have to imagine a zero-cut […]
Posted inMay 22, 2000: Save Our Sagebrush
‘Los Alamos is burning’
Los Alamos is burning. My wife stands in front of the TV in our home in Lewiston, Idaho, watching CNN with her hands to her face, tears in her eyes. She is whispering softly, a litany of actions from deep in her memory. “They have to pack their things. They have to take the family […]