Mountain pine beetles are attacking more forests and more
varieties of trees — and thriving at higher elevations than
ever before — and some scientists believe global climate
change is at the root of the problem.
Also in this issue: A recent Supreme Court
ruling in a Utah wilderness lawsuit will limit the ability of
citizens to sue the government over how its agencies manage natural
resources.
BLM gags an archaeologist to get out the gas
Critics say a slew of new projects could endanger Indian rock art and ruins
Keep shooting straight, HCN
Congratulations to you, the staff, and the HCN board for your in-depth reporting on environmental and natural resource issues in the West. Ideally, we would also prefer emphasis on collaborative efforts to manage land, water, and wildlife. Unfortunately, at the behest of its right-wing constituents, the Bush administration is dismembering environmental protection and cloaking these…
Oceans need a sea change
It’s time to wake up and smell the salt water. According to a recent report from the United States Commission on Ocean Policy, America’s oceans are overfished, polluted and in desperate need of new management policies. After three years of study, the President Bush-appointed commission came up with more than 200 preliminary recommendations aimed at…
Consensus nets results
As the president of the Rio Grande Water Conservation District, I have many responsibilities to attempt to prevent the types of water wars that ultimately tear communities apart. The fact is that in a small community like our San Luis Valley, nothing is possible if we are unable to present a united front in the…
Bush doesn’t collaborate
HCN is on the right track. Collaboration works with people who understand the concept. The Bush administration does not collaborate, but stubbornly follows its own agenda to its sole benefit. The mainstream papers have fallen down on the job and don’t call Bush on it. Now is the time to expose the policies of the…
Just the facts, please
As a newspaper publisher in the Western U.S. for 20 years, I make it a point not to cancel subscriptions out of anger. But, while I may yet be enlightened to a different perspective, I’ve found HCN, to which I subscribed in February, to be much more about ideology than news. Because it was too…
HCN fills the void
As a native of northwestern Colorado, I am a fan of High Country News. It has evolved from a tiny paper for people who care about the environment to a significant regional publication that contains news and opinions not found in nationally syndicated columns or major urban newspapers. I read it because I am a…
Follow-up
“If you build it, we will burn it!” read a fax claiming responsibility for a fire at a West Jordan, Utah, lumberyard in mid-June. The fire, set by the Earth Liberation Front, which now tops the FBI’s list of domestic terrorists, caused $1.5 million in damage to Stock Building Supply (HCN, 9/15/03: Burning one for…
HCN provides solace
I was drawn to HCN a year or so ago, when I read somewhere that HCN was the paper for people who care about the West. My first exposure to the sacrificing of the West for the good of the nation was the Trinity atomic bomb explosion — I was in the fourth grade in…
Dump the meaningless labels
Please don’t label me as one of “our more conservative readers,” but I agree that the paper seems to be exhibiting more of that old-fashioned enviro bias and heading in a more polarizing direction than the HCN of old. By “polarizing” I mean spinning stories in terms of those archaic categories of conservative vs. liberal,…
Wanted: Leak-proof dumps
Until the 1980s, conventional wisdom held that Wyoming was so arid that landfills didn’t need liners to prevent leaks. As a result, at least 21 of the state’s currently operating and closed municipal landfills are now leaking dangerous chemicals, such as nitrates, chlorides, pesticides and dry-cleaning solvents, into groundwater. The number could be even higher;…
Inspire us, don’t scare us
I’d agree with recent criticisms that your paper has taken a turn toward political bandwagoning. It mirrors most of the endless stream of imploring letters from the Sierra Club/Wilderness Society/Audubon Society/Nature Conservancy/Public Land Trust/Trust to Save the Grand Canyon or Silvery Minnow or Spotted Perch, etc., that find their way to my door every week.…
Mowing down pollution
The drone of lawn mowers is a classic sign of summer in the suburbs. But these gas guzzlers contribute heavily to another summer phenomenon: smog. The yearly pollution from one gas mower is equivalent to “43 new cars driving 12,000 miles each,” says Sam Atwood, a spokesman for the South Coast Air Quality Management District.…
We need solutions, not divisiveness
Looking at the opinions and positions of the writers in HCN, it’s clear that many don’t have the same ambivalence that I have. I grew up in the country of southwestern Pennsylvania and enjoyed it immensely. Always a rebel, I was pro-McGovern and anti-Nixon, and gradually became a Reagan Republican, ever retaining my love for…
Timber company collides with gas drillers
Conservationists have struck a $4 million deal with a progressive Canadian timber company, Tembec Inc., to protect land just west of the Glacier National Park/Waterton Lakes National Park complex. The Nature Conservancy of Canada is buying 3,800 acres of Elk River riparian habitat outright; purchasing a conservation easement on another 7,400 acres; and obtaining a…
HCN isn’t responsible for polarization
I am writing in support of HCN’s coverage of the Bush administration’s attack on the environment. I suppose, at one point, wanting a healthy habitat for human beings was a nonpartisan issue. Unfortunately, it seems these days if you care about anything that could be vaguely termed “social equity” or “conservation,” you’re automatically a pinko-commie…
Fight on, HCN
Regarding the note in “Dear Friends” about readers troubled by HCN’s tough coverage of the Bush administration’s policies across the West: Let ’em be troubled and angry! These are troubling, angry times. The Bush administration is carrying out an array of highly controversial policies across the West. I speak as one who’s been reporting on…
HCN bears witness
I am a longtime subscriber to HCN. The willingness to address the political causes of land-management decisions in the coverage of HCN was striking, with the selection of a new executive director. But I believe that it is important. Politics is the modus operandi of the corporations and their political allies who recognize only the…
Respect the people who care about the West
I love the subtitle of HCN, “The paper for people who care about the West.” I care about the West. I also care a great deal about the dialogue of people who care about the West. HCN is an important part of that dialogue, but I wish I could say I am comfortable with what…
Of global warming and White House elephants
Any day now, if all goes according to plan, a bill that will actually do something about global warming will come up in the United States Senate. Come up, and go right down. Not even the bill’s sponsors, Republican John McCain of Arizona and Democrat Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, predict passage. Their goal is to…
It’s over between us
I’m sorry to hear your board of directors gave you “a ringing endorsement” of your current editorial direction. It is for just that reason I’m letting my subscription lapse. I’ve been bothered by the increasingly strident and anti-Republican tone of your periodical as well as the sophomoric stereotyping of your articles. The confirmation you intend…
We need more from HCN
Thank you for the invitation to “toss in my two cents.” I literally grew up with your newspaper in my home. My late father, Louis A. “Sam” Bibler, subscribed to HCN beginning in the 1970s, and was one of your most enthusiastic readers. I lament the changes in your paper since that time, and especially…
King of Fish, Slave to Man
In his new book, David R. Montgomery wants Northwesterners lamenting the decline of wild Pacific salmon to know they’re not alone. King of Fish documents the death of Atlantic salmon, while pointing out that the same threats — and similar challenges — face salmon recovery around the world. Today, one-third of Pacific salmon stocks are…
Are you journalists or advocates?
No excuse that the “staff feels that the doings in D.C. are the most critical right now” to justify a lack of objectivity and balance. Maybe you and the staff need a refresher course in Journalism 101. Either you’re journalists or advocates, and should declare where you stand politically. Jim Nielson Cody, Wyoming This article…
Calendar
Learn about the State of the San Juans in Silverton, Colo., on Sept. 24-26. The conference, sponsored by the Mountains Studies Institute, will feature panels on local water issues, including the Animas River and the San Miguel Watershed, as well as on public-land partnerships and local restoration efforts. Colorado State Attorney General Ken Salazar is…
Global Warming’s Unlikely Harbingers
The West is heating up — and bark beetles are moving in for the kill
Roadkill is a right and a privilege, and don’t you forget it
Driving through northern Idaho this summer? Bring a fork. A judge in Bonners Ferry recently stood up for the right of people to eat the kind of roadkill that even other roadkill fanciers might find inedible. It sounds like one of those jokes bluegrass musicians tell: “How many banjo players does it take to eat…
The people who care about HCN
Two issues back, we invited readers to toss in their “two cents” about HCN’s coverage of the Bush administration’s environmental policies. We got about a million bucks in reply. Readers from all over the West wrote in to tell it like it is. One writer announced that he would not renew his subscription because of…
Heard around the West
ARIZONA Wearing brightly patterned robes and spectacular strands of African beads, Masai warriors livened up the town of Douglas in southern Arizona when they arrived to talk shop with local ranchers. Members of Arizona’s innovative Malpai Borderlands Group had visited the African herdsmen in 2002, and found they had lots in common. Both the Masai…
Dear friends
Visitors The letters have been pouring in to HCN, and so have the people — folks like Minneapolis subscriber Larry Weisner, who is traipsing across the West, and Flagstaff subscriber Jeff Latham, who is on the initial leg of a motorcycle trip to Alaska. Colleen Nunn, who works in the Western History/Genealogy Department at the…
Hot Times – Global Warming in the West
Note: this editor’s note introduces this issue’s feature story, “Global Warming’s Unlikely Harbingers.” The weather always gets the last laugh. It’s the rowdy guest at weddings, the unwelcome visitor at planting time, the cruel joker on the fire crew. It defeats our most dedicated efforts to plan ahead, rudely announcing that the climate is in…
Supreme Court reins in citizens’ right to sue
Conservationists can’t interfere with the government’s ‘own ordering of priorities’
Drilling done right?
‘Responsible’ gas development gets put to the test in northern New Mexico
Scientific Principle: Klamath whistleblower throws in the towel
In 2002, federal biologist Mike Kelly “blew the whistle” on the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), the agency responsible for protecting threatened and endangered salmon (HCN, 6/23/03: Sound science goes sour). As one of the scientists charged with ensuring that enough water was left in the Klamath River for rare coho salmon, Kelly discovered that…
Life cycle of a bark beetle
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Global Warming’s Unlikely Harbingers.” This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Life cycle of a bark beetle.