Salmon-killing dams may amount to ‘takings’ of tribal fishing rights
Rachel Odell
Feds to hand wolves to states
Idaho and Montana are poised to take greater control of gray wolves, but the Nez Perce Tribe, and some environmentalists, are resisting
Tribes ‘buy in’ to restore their river
Warm Springs Indians become dam owners in an effort to bring back salmon
Mountain bikers go wild
OREGON Environmentalists hoping to create a 37,000-acre Badlands Wilderness Area about 20 miles east of Bend, Ore., got a tremendous boost in February, when the local mountain bike group endorsed the proposal. Because bicycles are banned from wilderness areas, many mountain bikers are lukewarm, at best, about proposals to create more wilderness. But the biker-run […]
Can skiers and snowmobilers coexist?
With conflict on the rise, “quiet” recreationists want segregation in the backcountry
Groovers required for Deschutes boaters
That ammo-can groover — or its more modern counterpart, a pickle bucket fitted with a toilet-seat lid — is required gear for overnight boaters on the lower Deschutes River in Oregon this summer. The Bureau of Land Management has long beseeched river rats to pack out their sewage from trips along the popular 100-mile stretch […]
Northwest braces itself for wolves
Wild predators are ready to reintroduce themselves to Oregon
Griz numbers a mixed bag
WYOMING Federal biologists say the threatened Yellowstone grizzly bear population is healthy and increasing. This year, biologists counted 42 females with cubs in the grizzly bear recovery area, which encompasses Yellowstone National Park and surrounding areas for a total of 9,202 square miles, according to biologist Mark Haroldson. Last year, they counted only 35 bears […]
Parks test skiers’ green resolve
Backcountry recreators asked to give bighorn sheep some elbow-room
Forest supervisor faces down oil drilling
The public lands aren’t open for business – yet
Montana, feds find common ground for bison
Greens find no good news for the animals
Republicans rebuff snowmobile plan
WYOMING Just days after a Dec. 12 U.S. Supreme Court ruling handed the presidency to George W. Bush, Republicans were trying to undo a piece of President Clinton’s land protection legacy. Sen. Craig Thomas, R-Wyo., attached a last-minute rider to an omnibus appropriations bill prohibiting the National Park Service from spending any money to enforce […]
‘biles get the boot
A final winter use plan for Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks takes a hard line on snowmobiles. If approved, the plan will allow van-like snowcoaches on park roads, but will ban snowmobiles completely by the winter of 2003-2004. It’s a marked change from the draft plan, released last winter, that would have allowed snowmobiles […]
Whirlybirds will fly over Jackson
WYOMING After months of bitter debate, the Jackson Hole Airport at the edge of Grand Teton National Park has decided to allow some helicopter flights. Vortex Aircraft CEO Gary Kauffman originally proposed scenic air tours of the Jackson Hole Valley, the Bridger-Teton National Forest and the National Elk Refuge, but not over Teton National Park. […]
Incinerator plans go up in smoke
WYOMING Last April, Wilson, Wyo., resident Mary Mitchell called the Jackson Hole News demanding to know more about plans to burn nuclear waste at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory. But Jackson papers had paid no attention to the Department of Energy’s plans to build an incinerator in eastern Idaho, even though the facility […]
Parks rev up to ban snowmobiles
Yellowstone, Grand Teton could be snowmobile-free by 2002-03
Yellowstone wolves are here to stay
Almost 300 wolves that are part of a transplant program in Yellowstone National Park and Idaho can remain in their new homes, thanks to a new ruling. On Jan. 13, a three-judge panel from the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver reversed a two-year-old decision by Federal Judge William Downes that a federal […]
Downwinders speak up and pay up
More than 500 residents of Jackson Hole, Wyo., packed a meeting hall in late August to fight a nuclear-waste incinerator planned for eastern Idaho. The crowd rallied to the evangelical fervor of Gerry Spence, the flamboyant lawyer who has built a national career on high-profile cases. By the end of the evening, everyone from movie […]
DDT doesn’t just fade away
A half century after the National Park Service dumped DDT on the northern part of Yellowstone National Park, traces of the deadly pesticide remain in the ecosystem. Scientists studying cutthroat trout last summer tested fatty tissues of the fish and found DDT – even though it has been banned in this country since 1972, a […]
Montana won’t bend for bison
The Montana Department of Livestock continues to play hardball with bison leaving Yellowstone National Park despite urging from federal agencies to let the animals roam. In mid-March, state workers removed protesters blocking a Forest Service road near West Yellowstone, Mont., and arrested six members of the group, Buffalo Field Campaign. That cleared the way for […]
