Bravo, Rick Bass! But he didn’t go far enough (“A straight line in a contoured world,” HCN, 6/26/17). Trail construction destroys wildlife habitat — not just in the trail bed, but in a wide swath on both sides of the trail, where animals are inhibited from using their habitat. According to Ed Grumbine in Ghost Bears, the grizzly can hear a human from one mile away, and smell one from five miles away.
Mike Vandeman
San Ramon, California
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Trails versus wildlife.
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