Some people try to make a killing on killer bees
Ray Ring
Posted inJune 24, 2002: The buzz business
Dear Friends
Conflagration Troubles of the modern West continue to break out around the home of High Country News. A month ago in this space, we talked about coalbed-methane developers beginning to target the mesa slopes near our office in Paonia. Now the trouble is wildfire in areas where people have chosen to live. Even though the […]
Posted inJune 24, 2002: The buzz business
2,997 … 2,998 … 2,999
Note: This is a sidebar to a feature story about the killer-bee invasion of the West, headlined: The Buzz Business. Counting killer bee stings is a tedious chore. Usually the total is estimated, but one person gets exact counts – Justin Schmidt, a research entomologist who’s spent 22 years at the Carl Hayden Bee Research […]
Posted inMay 27, 2002: Wolf at the door
‘There isn’t much room for more wolves’
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Ralph Maughan is a professor of political science at Idaho State University in Pocatello, Idaho, and president-elect of the Wolf Recovery Foundation. He believes there are still reasons to worry: “There was no need to kill off all of the Whitehawk Pack. That […]
Posted inMay 27, 2002: Wolf at the door
Wolves still struggle in the Southwest
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. The effort to restore Mexican gray wolves to the Southwest started later and smaller than the restoration of wolves to the Northern Rockies, and it has run into stiffer local resistance. But “we’re on track,” says Colleen Buchanan, assistant Mexican wolf recovery coordinator for […]
Posted inMay 27, 2002: Wolf at the door
Wolf at the door
Now that the West’s top predator has reached civilization’s back porch, managers face some agonizing decisions
Posted inMay 27, 2002: Wolf at the door
‘I respect wolves. I still don’t like them killing our sheep.’
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Margaret Soulen Hinson helps run her family’s ranch near Weiser, Idaho, northwest of Boise. Wolves have killed 105 of the ranch’s sheep since 1995, but Soulen Hinson says: “In comparison to other predator problems, the wolves have been pretty minimal. We lose way more […]
Posted inApril 15, 2002: Raising a stink
Water threat inspires a rare alliance
Proposed power plants could draw down aWashington/Idaho aquifer
Posted inApril 1, 2002: Move over! Will snowmobile tourism relax its grip on a gateway town?
Move over! Will snowmobile tourism relax its grip on a gateway town?
Note: This feature story was accompanied by two sidebars, describing the slow progress in developing “greener” snowmobiles and the difficult Yellowstone National Park winter-use planning. — WEST YELLOWSTONE, Montana — On a sunny Thursday afternoon in mid-February, Glen Loomis, one of the snowmobile businessmen whose point of view dominates this small town, is telling me […]
Posted inApril 1, 2002: Move over! Will snowmobile tourism relax its grip on a gateway town?
Cleaner machines drive (slowly) toward Yellowstone
Note: This is a sidebar to a feature story about how snowmobilers dominate the small town of West Yellowstone. — WEST YELLOWSTONE, Montana — Soon this town, as well as Yellowstone National Park and the national forest trails, will begin to get some relief from one chronic problem – the smoke and associated air pollution […]
Posted inApril 1, 2002: Move over! Will snowmobile tourism relax its grip on a gateway town?
Winter-use plan lurches toward the finish line
Note: This is a sidebar to a feature story about how snowmobilers dominate the small town that’s the main gateway to Yellowstone National Park (West Yellowstone, Mont.). — The simplest way to evaluate snowmobile traffic in Yellowstone National Park is to flip-flop the season to summer: Imagine if most of the people touring the park […]
Posted inMarch 4, 2002: Seed in the ground
Westerners share a different reality
Time magazine recently gave Westerners a good laugh. Time’s “Your Technology” columnist, Anita Hamilton, wrote about her road test of a new satellite radio network. You’ve probably heard of satellite radio – it’s the latest breakthrough, promising to beam signals from orbit to your car radio whether you’re in Stinking Desert, Ariz., or Sodden Pass, […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Cheney picks former aide to oversee parks, BLM,wildlife
When Paul Hoffman went hunting in Wyoming’s Absaroka Mountains last fall, he shot a six-point bull elk. Then he cut it into steaks and burgers for his family to eat. Now he plans to take the stuffed head and antlers to Washington, D.C., to decorate his new office. “I think that’s one reason they picked […]
Posted inFebruary 18, 2002: Here lies the Rio Grande
Greens join ‘Let’s derail a judge’ game
Federal judges around the West have often been the backstop protecting everything environmental, from stream quality to spotted owls. So it’s surprising when green groups say some judges are systematically undercutting their work. But some “highly ideological and activist judges are threatening the very core of environmental law,” warns a campaign by a dozen groups, […]
Posted inJanuary 21, 2002: Finding the words
Judge puts kibosh on logging plan
The Forest Service’s rush to cut Montana’s burned Bitterroot forest
Posted inDecember 17, 2001: Bad moon rising
Ranchers’ group adopts practical strategy
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. One Montana environmental group grew from different roots than most of the movement. The Northern Plains Resource Council was founded by cattle ranchers who opposed coal strip-mining 30 years ago – and today, ranchers and farmers make up about half the 3,000 members. Moreover, […]
Posted inDecember 17, 2001: Bad moon rising
Bad moon rising
How Montana’s once-mighty progressive coalition has waned
Posted inDecember 17, 2001: Bad moon rising
‘We don’t rest … on economics’
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Bob Decker has put in 14 years working for several Montana wilderness groups. Now he’s executive director of the Montana Wilderness Association, which, he says, works the grass roots, with 10 staffers in offices spread around the state. Eighty-five percent of the group’s 4,300 […]
Posted inDecember 17, 2001: Bad moon rising
‘We better start moving ahead’
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Wayne Hirst is an accountant in Libby, the small town in northwest Montana where asbestos mining has sickened hundreds and led to the town’s consideration as a Superfund site (HCN, 3/13/00: Libby’s dark secret). Libby is more than half busted, with the logging industry […]
Posted inOctober 8, 2001: Whoa! Canada!
Ranchers sour on Canadian gas plant
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story. Call the main phone number for the big Shell Canada natural gas processing plant in rural Pincher Creek, and the first thing you hear is an automated greeting that seems to assume you’re calling about an environmental crisis: “Thank you for calling the Shell-Waterton […]