No big thing happens for just one reason. This season’s fires, cutting broad swaths across the Southwest, result from the convergence of three powerful forces: climatic drought, institutional tunnel vision, and old-fashioned human frailty. On the face of it, the drought is simple: There hasn’t been much rain or snow across much of the region, […]
William Debuys
Posted inWotr
The problem of Western water is not what you think
The dirty little secret about Western water is that water conservation is a hoax, or at best a waste of time. When we conserve water by using less, we don’t save it for the health of the watershed or put it aside in any way; we simply make it available for someone else to consume, […]
Posted inWotr
Climate change: Check the data yourself
A collaborative online effort allows both skeptics and believers to study and compare the facts.
Posted inSeptember 9, 2008: Reclaiming the low country
A Western primer
The Rocky Mountain Land Library asked a panel of Western writers a simple question: What books would you recommend to the next president? What does the next administration need to know about the American West? Our respondents were both generous and inspired with their suggestions. Although I’m sure they would all agree with author Rick […]
Posted inJuly 3, 2000: A river resurrected
Los Alamos fire offers a lesson in humility
The Cerro Grande fire in the Jemez Mountains of northern New Mexico blackened 42,869 acres, destroyed the homes of 400 families, and penetrated the security of Los Alamos National Laboratories more effectively than any Cold War enemy. In much the same way that the Cerro Grande restarted ecological succession on the scorched slopes above Los […]
Posted inApril 10, 2000: Beyond the Revolution
In search of a politics of union
So far, a bigger table for decision-making has not led to more agreement, just more litigation
Posted inApril 12, 1999: Is trapping doomed?
Saint Contrary: John Wesley Powell
If the American West were to adopt a secular, flawed, feet-of-clay patron saint, John Wesley Powell, whose March 24th birthday just passed, would be the man. Powell, who was born in 1834 and died in 1902, epitomized grit and courage, qualities the West likes to honor. He lost an arm at Shiloh commanding a battery […]
Posted inFebruary 5, 1996: Lack of enchantment: Santa Fe's boom goes flat
Separating sense from nonsense in New Mexico’s forests
Environmentalists in northern New Mexico have a chance to show their better side. Having brought things to a halt in the recent, unnecessary crisis over firewood on Carson National Forest (HCN, 12/25/95), they might now show they can start things that need to get started. The crisis resulted from a lawsuit over the Mexican spotted […]