Imagine a water conference focused not on fluvial geomorphology, hydraulics, creek restoration, riparian grazing management, stream bank erosion, non-point source pollution, cumulative water resource impact assessment and the like, but instead on water as a mysterious, magical, extraordinary substance. That’s what former Hopi chairman Vernon Masayevsa had in mind when he conceived “Braiding Through Water: […]
Marty Durlin
Posted inGoat
Camelina, Montana’s wonder crop?
Just last September, the FDA granted permission to include two percent camelina meal — a byproduct of producing the fuel — in the mix given to feedlot beef cattle and swine. The meal has protein levels of 40 percent or more, and is also high in Omega-3 fatty acids. Camelina is well suited to Montana […]
Posted inArticles
Wind River revelations
To listen to the audio interview you need to have the Adobe Flash Player installed and Javascript enabled. Lisa Jones talks about Northern Arapaho horse whisperer and healer Stanford Addison, the subject of her book, Broken.
Posted inGoat
The line is busy
Back in 1991 when the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment set up the call center to process people who need unemployment benefits, it seemed like a good way to increase efficiency and prevent long lines at the office. Back then, there were about 400 calls a day. Fast forward to 2009. “What we’re seeing […]
Posted inArticles
A passion to protect
Glo Cunningham perseveres over three decades in Crested Butte
Posted inGoat
Outlaws with guns
Tomorrow Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder will visit Mexico to discuss ways to halt the flow of guns across the border. Mexico has some of the strictest gun control laws in the world, but its drug cartels are armed with high-powered weapons smuggled over the border from the United […]
Posted inGoat
Colorado’s job bias complaints soar
Nancy Sienko became Colorado’s Equal Employment Opportunity Commission field office director three years ago, in the middle of a surge of discrimination charges. While job-based discrimination complaints grew by 17 percent in the United States in the past five years, the caseload in Colorado exploded by 46 percent in the same time period. Sienko, with […]
Posted inWotr
Would you want to live near a wind farm?
If there’s an iconic image of the new push for domestic green energy, it’s the wind turbine photographed against a luminous horizon. Its sleek aerodynamic blades turn silently and steadily, providing happy Americans with clean, dependable energy. But there’s another image that’s becoming increasingly associated with wind power, and that’s its angry next-door neighbors. In […]
Posted inGoat
The “tyranny of fleece”
President Obama today named activist and author Van Jones — an African American — as his Special Advisor on Green Jobs. Perhaps no one is more qualified to dole out stimulus funds for green jobs than Jones — especially now, as more and more people are impacted by a deteriorating environment and a failing economy. […]
Posted inGoat
Wind power and wildlife don’t mix
Montana ranks fifth in wind energy potential in the U.S., with an estimated capacity of 116,000 megawatts over 17 million windy acres. To date, the state has installed less than 300 MW of wind power, but more projects are underway. Hoping to “spark cooperative efforts between wind energy and conservation interests, so that the promise […]
Posted inGoat
West Nile virus and avian biodiversity
Researchers John Swaddle and Stavros Calos have found that high bird diversity is linked with low incidence of the West Nile virus in humans. Their study can be found online. Called the “dilution effect,” the link between biodiversity and disease rates is not completely clear, but scientists believe that increased diversity within an ecosystem reduces […]
Posted inFebruary 16, 2009: The Half-life of Memory
Wind setbacks
Local governments grapple with where to put wind farms
Posted inGoat
Montana state senator proposes slaughterhouse
The shuttering of the last U.S. slaughterhouse in Illinois in 2007 and the tanking economy have created a glut of horses across the nation. Horse rescues have been filled to capacity. BLM wild horse auctions have drawn almost no bidders. These days you can hardly give a horse away, let alone sell one. Now comes […]
Posted inGoat
Meth in the West
The West continues to be the hot spot for meth in the U.S., leading the rest of the country with 65 percent of meth treatment admissions, according to a new 171-page study by the RAND Drug Policy Research Center. The National Survey on Drug Use and Health puts Nevada first in meth use, with 2.02 […]
Posted inArticles
Woman on the water
To listen to the audio interview you need to have the Adobe Flash Player installed and Javascript enabled. Heather Wylie was a biologist working for the Army Corps of Engineers when she joined a group of people kayaking down the Los Angeles River – a “giant concrete trough” that runs more than 50 miles through […]
Posted inGoat
Power struggle
Move over, gas wells. Here comes the latest NIMBY issue: the construction of new transmission lines, an Obama administration priority as the new president seeks to stimulate the economy and rebuild U.S. infrastructure. A proposal from Idaho Power Co., touted as a regional and national priority, is causing quite a stir in rural Oregon’s Baker […]
Posted inArticles
Finding a nuclear waste dump
Judith Lewis speaks about her story on Yucca Mountain
Posted inGoat
Western legislators stake out nuclear positions
President-elect Barack Obama says he favors nuclear energy, and yesterday his Energy secretary nominee Steven Chu said he intends to fast-track the construction of new domestic nuclear plants. At the same time, Obama is against the proposed high-level nuclear storage facility at Nevada’s Yucca Mountain. With just days remaining before Obama takes office, Western politicians […]
Posted inArticles
Video: Humor in a world gone mad
Travis Kelly creates cartoons in order to stay sane